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13 



Infant Baptism 



BRIEFLY CONSIDERED 

BY REV. N. DOANE, 

OF THE OREGON" CONFEREN'CE. 



Tnfjints. acrordinfT to the nsn.<re of the Cliuroh. are 1 aptiz*^<l. . . . '^■^f* 
Chuicli received from t!u* apostk's an order to g-ive bnptisin to infants. — 
Ofigev. 

The ^race of God [in baptism] is ta be denied to no person that is born. - 
(^oj)' hni. 

The custom of our motlier. the ("Irn-ch. iu baptizinfr infants, is l-y no 
iii(.'rir..»; to be disre^iiai ded. , . . For niy I'f^rt I do not remcuiber tliat 1 ever 
hep.rd any other thin_L'- from any < hrist an . . . that 1 evrr read otherwise 
of any writer that I could evt-r find trcatinjr of these matters. — A2((/ii.sfi)ie. 

Men do sLinder me. as if \ denied tiie sacrament of baptism to infants. 1 
never heard even an impious heretic wlio could atiirm this concernhig 
iiifants. — rehiinu.-i. 



NEW YORK: " 
NELSON c^ PHIlLI" PS 
CIX IXXATI : 

HITCHCOCK & W A L D E N . 

1-73- 




^^ 



"•-■■■• • -SS 

\VM!'NaTON 



.3^ 



Entered according to Act of CongTcss, in tlie year 1875, by 

NELSON & PHILLIPS, 

in the Oilice of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. 



P E E F AC E 



IN these days of Evangelical Alliances and 
cultivated catholicity among the different 
bodies of Christians, it may seem to some an 
intrusion to attempt the discussion of a theme 
which bears the least aspect of controversy. 
It may be regarded as unfraternal to call atten- 
tion, even, to a disputed doctrme, the vindication 
of which may possibly interrupt the flow of the 
oily waters of peace. 

But the time should never be when the pious 
may feel themselves at liberty to yield their 
conscientious convictions, even for the sake 
of harmony ; nor should the time ever come, 
when a close and careful examination of candid 
differences of opinion among the friends of 
Jesus may not be submitted to — provided it 
be conducted under the influence of Christian 
charity — though they differ widely and radically 
in their views of truth and duty. 

It is from a conviction of the verity of this 
latter statement that this little volume has been 



4 Preface. 

written ; and the endeavor has been to satisfy 
the minds of those who are ready to inquire, 
" What valid reasons are there for Infant Bap- 
tism f or, '^ Has the practice of baptizing in- 
fants the authority and sanction of the Sacred 
Scriptures ? '' 

To answer these interrogatories in a plain way, 
with facts, arguments, testimony , and Scripture, 
to the satisfaction of the candid inquirer after 
the truth, and to the comprehension of the 
illiterate as well as of the learned who may 
read these pages, has been the purpose of the 
writer in penning them. Whether he has been 
entirely successful in the purpose will be de- 
termined by those who will give the book an 
attentive perusal. If it shall appear that the 
effort has been of service in rescuing any from 
the toils of doubt and difficulty in regard to 
their baptism in infancy, and in settling the 
minds of any who have been fickle and waver- 
ing in their convictions respecting the divine 
authority for the practice, the writer will feel 
the satisfaction which those only can enjoy who 
have labored for so noble a purpose. N. D. 
East Portland, Oregon, December 21, 1874, 



CONTENTS. 



■♦- 



Chapter Pasb 

I. Objections Answered 7 

II. The Church — Its Organization 19 

III. The Church — Its Identity in the Jewish 

AND Christian Dispensations 32 

§ I. Statements of the Subject 32 

§ 2. Identity of the Church — Scriptural Argument. 36 
§ 3. Identity of the Church — Scriptural Argument 

Continued 55 

§ 4. The Church — Identity shown from Passages 

m the Old Testament Scriptures 64 

§ 5. The Church — Its Identity shown from Pas- 
sages in the New Testament Scriptures. ... 72 

IV. All the Teachings of Christ and his Apos- 

tles, touching the Relation of Infants 
TO THE Church, plainly recognizes their 
Membership 85 

V. Historical Testimony ; Or, the Testimony of 

the early Christian Fathers 99 

§ I. The Testimony of Justin Martyr, A.D. 140. . loi 

§ 2. The Testimony of Irenseus, A.D. 178 106 

§ 3. The Testimony of Tertullian, A.D. 200 .... no 

§ 4, The Testimony of Origen, A.D. 230 118 



6 Contents. 

Page. 

§ 5. The Testimony of Cyprian, A.D. 248 123 

§ 6. The Testimony of Gregory Nazianzen, A.D. 

370 130 

§ 7. The Testimony of Augustine, A.D. 415 .... 136 
§ 8. The Testimony of Pelagius and Celestius, 

A.D. 417 143 

§ 9. The Testimony of Jerome and the Fifth 

Council of Carthage, A.D. 417 151 

§ 10. Statements and Conclusion 152 



INFANT BAPTISM 



CHAPTER I. 

OBJECTIONS ANSWERED. 



THE builder, before laying the foundation 
for the structure he may be about to raise, 
removes first the rubbish that he may not be 
encumbered with it in the prosecution of his 
purpose. Before presenting any argument in 
vindication of the practice of the Church in 
giving baptism to infants, it will be necessary 
to answer sundry objections which are frequent- 
ly and freely urged against the practice, other- 
wise the mind of the reader, beset by these, will 
fail to estimate the force of the evidence upon 
the subject. 

I. It is objected, " There is no Scripture 
precept — no express command — for baptizing in- 
fants ; therefore the authority upon which they 
are baptized is not that of the Scriptures." 



8 * Infant Baptism, 

In answering the objection, it is admitted that 
there is in the Scriptures no plain, positive com- 
mand, in so many words, to give the ordinance 
to infants ; but the inference of " no Scripture 
authority," which the objector has drawn from 
the premises, does not follow. 

It would be gratifying to be furnished and 
fortified with a '' thus saith the Lord," for all 
that we believe, teach, and practice ; but in the 
absence of " express command," legitimate infer- 
ejice, founded upon obvious warrant of Scripture, 
may indicate the will of God as unmistakably as 
it is possible for express precept to do it. 

No Church waits for express commarid in all 
matters of faith or practice ; but all classes of 
Christians proceed upon evidence merely in- 
ferential, in matters as important as the ad- 
ministration of the sacraments. We have, for 
example, nothing like express command for 
giving either Christian baptism or the Lord's 
supper to females, and yet no Church with- 
holds these ordinances from this class of its 
membership. The Church, therefore, that would 
withhold baptism from infants for want of "ex- 
press command," would for the same reason, to 
be consistent, withhold both the sacraments 
from its female members. 



Objections Answered, 9 

II. " It can do no good ; what good can it do 
to sprinkle a little water upon the head or in 
the face of an unconscious babe ? " 

It might as properly be asked " what good 
will it do " to baptize any person in any man- 
ner ? It is not our business to ask " what goo 1," 
or how much or how ''little goody' it will do to 
administer baptism to any. We are not re- 
quired to baptize on the ground that we can 
estimate the good that may come of it, either di- 
rectly or indirectly. It is sufficient to believe it 
to be the will of God; and upon this ground, and 
no other, can we be justified in giving the ordi- 
nance either to infants or adults, or in withhold- 
ing it from either. There can be no doubt as 
to the benefit or usefulness of the divine institu- 
tions, but our opinion of their utility is not the 
ground on which we are either to receive or ad- 
minister them. Abraham might not have been 
able to pronounce upon \h^ good of circumcis- 
ing his sons, but he did well in complying with 
what he believed to be the Divine will in plac- 
ing the sign of the covenant upon them. 

III. "Infant baptism takes away the liberty 
of the child!' 

Mr. Woolsey, Baptist, author of a treatise on 
baptism, says : '' Infant baptism deprives the 



10 Infant Baptism. 

subject of the rights of private judgment." He 
descants like a patriot upon the ''noble and 
evangelical sentiments of the framers of the 
Declaration of American Independence, 'That 
men are created equal ; that they are endowed 
by their Creator with certain inalienable rights ; 
that among these are life, liberty ^ ttc. He 
talks of "our parents" having not the right to 
take " advantage of oitr infancy^' etc. 

The whole thing looks like making a man of 
straw to shoot at. The "liberty of the child," 
the "rights of private judgment," and the "in- 
alienable rights of liberty," are phrases which, 
in their proper connection, indicate an endow- 
ment of which none may deprive us without in- 
justice ; but in the connection in which Mr. 
Woolsey has placed them they must mean 
either, first, "The liberty" of choosing between 
baptism and no baptism, which is really choos- 
ing between religion and no religion, in which 
case the objection would be equally against 
all religious teaching of the youthful mmd, as 
the tendency of such teaching is to bias and 
prepossess it in favor of religion, to which no 
Christian could object ; or, second, it must mean 
" The liberty " of choosing between different modes 
of baptisin. 



Objections Answered, 1 1 

Now, it is a significant fact, that no class of 
Christians objects to infant baptism (unless it 
be the Quakers) but those who baptize exclu- 
sively by immersion ; and they, of all people, 
should be the very last to declaim about the 
injustice of "depriving the subject of the rights 
of private judgment " in the matter of baptism. 
Do they allow the subject or candidate the right 
of private judgment in choosing a mode of bap- 
tism? Far from it ! The obiection comes with 
ill grace from such a quarter. The truth is, we 
may as well object to the parent proposing to 
instruct, or in any way endeavoring to pre- 
engage, the faith and affection of the child in 
favor of any particular system of reHgious teach- 
ing or doctrine, as to object to its baptism. But 
that it is the duty of all Christian parents to in- 
struct their children, and to train them up, in 
accordance with their own views of religion, no 
one will deny, and none are more tenacious of 
the right than those who urge the objection 
under consideration. 

IV. '' Many persons baptized in infancy are 
dissatisfied with their infant baptism ; it should 
therefore be dispensed with!' 

No ; few persons, comparatively, are dissat- 
isfied with their infant baptism. The great ma- 



12 Infant Baptism. 

jority are entirely satisfied with it, as is evident 
from the fact, in the great majority of the most 
populous Churches, that the number of infants 
annually baptized is constantly increasing. The 
Methodist Episcopal Church, in 1865, baptized 
32,891 infants. There was a uniform increase 
up to 1 87 1, when the number baptized was 
54,517, an aggregate increase in six years of 
21,626. Since 1869 the number baptized each 
year is considerably in excess of 50,000. This is 
probably a fair sample of the increase in Amer- 
ican Pedobaptist Churches. These facts do not 
indicate much " dissatisfaction " with the prac- 
tice. It is presumed that no7ie would be dis- 
satisfied if they were properly instructed, unless 
their minds were perplexed and perverted by 
the selfish intermeddUng of proselyters. Efforts 
have not been wanting in some communities to 
disturb the minds of some by the suggestion : 
*' In case you are not satisfied with your infant 
baptism, you ca7i be baptized again!' 

No practice of the Church has, in these mod- 
ern days, met with fiercer opposition from cer- 
tain classes of professed Christians than that of 
infant baptism, and the reason is obvious. Un- 
less the baptized in infancy can be disturbed in 
their belief of the evangelical character of the 



Objections Answered. 13 

ordinance thus administered, they ca7t never be 
proselyted. 

V. ''Faith is required in order to baptism y 
(Mark xvi, 16,) * He that believeth and is bap- 
tized shall be saved ;' but infants cannot exercise 
faith; they should not, therefore, be baptized." 

Faith, in order to baptism, is required of 
adiUts only. The impropriety and injustice of 
applying the rule (requiring faith in order to 
baptism.) to infants, is seen in the fact that if it 
be thus applied it would as surely debar them 
from salvation as from baptism ; because it is 
said, *' He that believeth and is baptized shall 
be saved ; but he that believeth not shall be 
damned." 

We do not believe that infants should not be 
saved because they cannot believe ; why should 
we believe that infants should not be baptizedho,- 
cause they cannot believe ? Can a Baptist give 
an answer to this objection, on the ground of 
the above question } If (in the light of Mark 
xvi, 16) not believing be no barrier to an in- 
fant's being saved; then, in the light of the same 
Scriptures, why should not believing be a bar- 
rier to an infant's being baptized? " It's a poor 
rule that wont work both ways." " That which 
proves too much, proves nothing." 



14 Infant Baptism. 

The presentation of the last objection has 
opened a mine of truth which it were well not 
to abandon in haste. Why do Baptists give 
the ordinance to adults ? Is it because they 
believe, or because, believing, they are regener- 
ated f Is it because they use the means to the 
end — salvation — or because they have reached 
and realized the end ? Is it not because they 
have received '' the end of" their *' faith, even 
the salvation of their '^ souls f " It is, undoubt- 
edly. The Baptists give the ordinance to no 
one unless he professes an "experience" winch 
is deemed a satisfactory evidence of conversion. 

Let it be remembered, then, that the Baptist 
^^ believer " is not baptized because he believes, 
but because he is justified and regenerated, as 
the result of his faith. So the LtUherans, Pres- 
byterians, Orthodox Congregationalists, dc^A Meth- 
odists hold that baptism symbolizes not the 
means of salvation, whatever it be, but salvation. 
itself. " Baptism is ... a sign of regeneration, 
or the new birth',' says the Methodist Discipline. 
Art. xvii. Wesley's teaching, received by all 
denominations of Methodists, is, that it is " the 
outward sign of an inward grace." But Armin- 
ian theology, as taught by Wesley, Fletcher, 
Fisk, Hibbard, Whedon, and others, regards all 



Objections Answered, 15 

infants as being in a justified and regenerated 
state. In a note in " Fletcher's Checks/' vol. i, 
p. 461, he says : " Those who start at every ex- 
pression they are not used to, will ask if our 
Church admits the justification of infants. I 
answer: Undoubtedly, since her clergy, by her 
direction, say over myriads of infants, ' We 
yield thee hearty thanks, most merciful Father, 
that it has pleased thee to regenerate this infant 
with thy Holy Spirit, to receive him for thy own 
child,' etc. And in her Catechism she teaches 
all children to say, as soon as they can speak, 
' I heartily thank our heavenly Father that he 
hath called me to this state of salvation.' " He 
then proceeds to show that this infant justifica- 
tion and regeneration are universal. Mr. Wes- 
ley, commenting on the Saviour's words, " Suf- 
fer little children, and forbid them not, to come 
unto me, for of such is the kingdom of heaven,'* 
argues that children have a right to member- 
ship in the regenerate Church on earth, which 
is " the kingdom of heaven," because of their 
resfenerate condition. 

Dr. Fisk's views, as quoted in the " Methodist 
Quarterly Review" for January, 1873, are as fol- 
lows : " Although all moral depravity, derived 
or contracted, is damning in its nature ; still, 



i6 Infant Baptism. 

by virtue of the atonement, the destructive 
effects of derived depravity are counteracted ; 
and the guilt is not imputed until, by a volun- 
tary rejection of the Gospel remedy, man makes 
the depravity of his nature the object of his 
own choice. Hence, although, abstractly con- 
sidered, this depravity is destructive to the pos- 
sessors, yet thviigh the grace of the Gospel 
all ai'c born free from condemnation. So the 
Apostle Paul : '' As by the offense of one judg- 
ment came upon all men to condemnation ; even 
so by the righteousness of one the free gift came 
upon all men unto justification of life." — Cal- 
vinistic Co72troversy. 

Dr. Hibbard is well known to the Church as 
a decided and firm advocate of the doctrines of 
i7if ant justification and regeneration ; and Whe- 
don says: ''We believe it clear that Dr. Hib- 
bard's view " (of the infant condition) '' is about 
the view of the Church, if her formulas are to 
decide the question." 

Dr. Whedon's views are set forth in the follow- 
ing words : '' No one affirms that the regeneration 
of an infant, as taught by Fletcher, is psycho- 
logically absurd, or contrary to human or Chris- 
tian consciousness. Tlie doctrine of infant regen- 
eration, either imconditional or conditional upon 



Objections Answered, ly 

baptism, is no new doctrine, but has been a dogma 
in all the great sections of the Church, zvhether 
Greek, Roman, or Protestant. . . . The regen- 
eration of the infant is nothing different in 
nature from that of the adult, except as modi- 
fied by its subject ; and the use of the term is in 
both cases equally proper, involving no innova- 
tion in theology of either thought or language. 
If an infant can be depraved it can also be un- 
depraved ; if it can be positively tmregenerate it 
can also be rege7terate. In the infant nature as 
truly as in the adult there may exist all the 
potencies, predispositions, and predeterminate 
tendencies, natural or gracious, for an actual 
though not responsible moral nature, good or 
bad. The doctrine of depravity is neither in- 
validated in nor modified by the doctrine of 
infant regeneration, whether unconditional or 
conditioned upon birth, baptism, or death, actual 
or approaching. In either case the depravity 
comes from Adam, is by nature, and is equally 
complete ; and in either case, regeneration comes 
from Christ and is by grace, being extra to and 
above nature. The unborn John the Baptist was 
to be 'filled with the Holy Ghost,' (Luke i, 15,) 
and Meaped' (verse 41) at the approach of the 

mother of the unborn Saviour. The unborn 
3 



i8 Infant Baptism. 

Jesus was 'that holy thing/ And such cases 
at once explode the objection of the 'manifest 
absurdity ' of ' regeneration between conception 
and birth/ And this would seem to finish, too, 
all the argument about the absurdity of genera- 
tion and regeneration being simultaneous/' 

Clearly, then, it is a doctrine of the Methodist 
Episcopal Church, tJiat infants graciously oc- 
cupy the relation of tlie justified, and inhe^dt the 
condition of the regenerate ; and all the g7'eat sec- 
tions of the Church, whether Greek, Roman, or 
Protestant — either unconditional or conditioned 
upon baptism — Jiold the same doctrine.^ 

If, therefore, the Baptists administer baptism 
to the subject because he is regenei^ated, should 
they object to others administering it when the 
subject is in the same state ? 

* I have dwelt longer and been more particular on infant 
justification and regeneration than may to some appear need- 
ful, not only because it is demanded by the argument, but 
also because some of our oldest and best theologians, for 
holding this doctrine, have been accounted heretical. 



The Church — its Organizatio7t, 19 



CHAPTER 11. 

THE CHURCH ITS ORGANIZATION. 

IT will probably be admitted by all parties, 
that in the Christian dispensation all who 
have a right to membership in the Church 
of God, and no others, ought to receive bap- 
tism ; for, whatever other purposes baptism may 
serve, it is undoubtedly to be regarded as the 
initiatory rite into the visible Church. In order, 
therefore, to determine what characters are en- 
titled to baptism, according to the law of God, 
it will be necessary to inquire what characters 
have a right to a place in the Church. In order 
to determine this latter question we must refer 
back to its original organization. It is when 
the organization is first effected, in all organ- 
ized bodies or societies of men, that the terms 
or conditions of membership are most fully 
specified. 

Before we proceed further, it may be proper 
to define what we are to understand by the 
Chicrch. By the invisible Chztrch, is meant all 
God 's people. " By the word Churchl' says 



20 Infant Baptism. 

Richard Watson, " we are to understand the 
whole body of God's true people, in every pe- 
riod of time : this is the invisible or spiritual 
Church." 

The visible Church may be briefly defined, 
any body of people separated from the zvo7dd for 
the service of God, zvith divinely appoiitted ordi- 
nances and rites of initiation. The Nineteenth 
Article of the Church of England defines it, 
" A congregation of faithful men, in which the 
true word of God is preached, and the sacra- 
ments duly administered, according to Christ's 
ordinances, in all things that of necessity are 
requisite to the same." 

But wJien, and where, and with whom was 
the visible Church organized? For more than 
twenty centuries the people of God wore no 
distinguishing badge or outward mark by which 
they were known to be separated from the 
world and recognized as God's people ; they 
were known only by Him who ''looketh not on 
the outward appearance, but on the heart," un- 
less, indeed, their character and peculiar heir- 
ship were discerned by the *' fruits of right- 
eousness" which they bore. To these people 
God made promises from time to time, which, 
faintly at first, but afterward more and more 



The Church — its Organization. 21 



^) 



plainly, shadowed forth the coming and char- 
acter of the Messiah, and the fuller light and 
influence of the divine Spirit upon the world. 
Early, however, in the history of the post-dilu- 
vian nations, God appeared unto Abram, a resi- 
dent of " Ur of the Chaldees," for the purpose 
of bringing him and his family into more inti- 
mate and visible covenant relation with him- 
self ; separating him from his own kindred and 
nation, and unfolding more fully to him the 
covenant of grace, which '' in the fullness of 
times," was to be ratified by the blood of Christ ; 
and placing upon the person of Abram, (whose 
name was now changed to Abraham, as more 
expressive of his heirship of the world by virtue 
of his covenant obligation,) and each of his male 
descendants, an outward and visible token or 
mark of the covenant into which, as a party, they 
were now entering. Hence we read of the Lord's 
saying unto Abram, " I will make of thee a great 
na' ion, and I will bless thee, and make thy name 
great ; and thou shalt be a blessing : and I will 
bless them that bless thee, and curse him that 
curseth thee : and in thee shall all families of the 
earth be blessed!' Gen. xii, 2, 3. And again, *' Lift 
up now thine eyes, and look from the place where 
thou art northward, and southward, and eastward, 



22 Infant Baptism. 

and westward : for all the land which thou see- 
est, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for- 
ever. And I will make thy seed as the dust of 
the earth : so that if a man can number the 
dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be 
numbered. Gen. xiii, 14-16. And again, " Look 
now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou 
be able to number them : and he said unto him, 
So shall thy seed be. And he believed in the 
Lord ; and he counted it to him for right- 
eousness." Gen. XV, 5,6. And again, "I am the 
Almighty God ; walk before me, and be thou 
perfect. . . . And God talked with him, saying, 
As for me, behold, my covenant is with thee, 
and thou shalt be a father of many nations. 
Neither shall thy name any more be called 
Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham ; for a 
father of many nations have I made thee. And 
I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I will 
make nations of thee, and kings shall come out 
of thee. And I will establish my covenant be- 
tv/een me and thee and thy seed after thee in 
their generations, for an everlasting covenant, 
to be a God unto thee and to thy seed after 
thee. And I v/ill give unto thee, and to thy 
seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a 
stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an ever* 



The Church — its Organization, 23 

lasting possession ; and I will he their God. 
Thou shalt keep my covenant therefore, thou, 
and thy seed after thee in their generations. 
This is my covenant, which ye shall keep, be- 
tween me and you and thy seed after thee ; 
Every man child among yott shall be circumcised. 
And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your fore- 
skin ; and it shall be a token of the covenant 
between me and you. And he that is eight 
days old shall be circumcised among you, every 
man child in your generations, he that is born 
in the house, or bought with money of any stran- 
ger, w^hich is not of thy seed. He that is born 
in thy house, and he that is bought with thy 
money, must needs be circumcised : and my 
covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting 
covenant. And the uncircumcised man child 
whose flesh ... is not circumcised, that soul 
shall be cut off from his people ; he hath broken 
my covenantr Gen. xvii, 1-14. And again, '' In 
blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I 
will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, 
and as the sand which is upon the sea-shore ; and 
thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies : 
and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth 
be blessed!' Gen. xxii, 17, 18. And again, to 
Isaac, '' I will perform the oath w^hich I sware 



24 Infant Baptism. 

unto Abraham thy father ; and I will make thy 
seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will 
give unto thy seed all these countries ; and in 
thy seed shall all the nations of the eartli be 
blessed!' Gen. xxvi, 3, 4. And again, to Jacob, 
*' Thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth ; and 
thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the 
east, and to the north, and to the south : and in 
thee and /;/ tliy seed shall all the families of the 
earth be blessed." Gen. xxviii, 14. 

This certainly was a remarkable transaction ; 
and it must have marked an epoch in the his- 
tory of mankind. Nothing like this had ever 
transpired between the divine Being and any of 
the members of the human family, so far as the 
inspired records show, anterior to the event of 
God's appearing to Abram for the purpose of 
making this covenant with him and his family. 

Here, then, we have the original organization 
of the visible Chicreh of God — a people separated 
from the world for the service of God, wearing 
a badge of distinction, an ordinance of divine 
appointment, a " token of the covenant " into 
which they had entered with Him. How well 
does this view of the case accord with the fol- 
lowing from Mr. Watson, {Die, p. 241 :) " Prior 
to the days of Abraham, this " (the invisible) 



TJie Chinxh — its Organization. 25 

'* Church, though scattered up and down the 
world, and subject to many changes in its 
worship through the addition of new revelations, 
was still but one and the same, because found- 
ed in the same covenant," (the promise of the 
Messiah given to Adam, which contained in it 
something of the nature of a covenant,) " and 
interested thereby in all the benefits or privi- 
leges that God has granted, or would at any 
time grant. In process of time, God was 
pleased to restrict his Church, as far as visible 
acknowledgment went, in a great measure, to 
the seed of Abraham. With the latter he re- 
newed his covenant, requiring that he should 
walk before him and be upright. He also con- 
stituted him the father of the faithful, or of all 
them that beheve, and the ' heir of the world.* 
So that since the days of Abraham the Church 
has, in every age, been founded upon the cove- 
nant made with that patriarch, and on the work 
of redemption which was to be performed ac- 
cording to that covenant. Now wheresoever 
this covenant made with Abraham is, and with 
whomsoever it is established, with them is the 
Church of God, and to them all the promises 
and privileges of the Church really belong." 
I am aware that many who reject infant bap- 



26 Infant Baptism. 

tism stoutly deny that God organized a Church 
with Abraham, and affirm that the '^ covenant," 
the token of which was circumcision, did not 
confirm either to Abraham or to his posterity 
any inheritance of a spiritual character. They 
tell us that Jewish children receiving circum- 
cision received no advantage thereby, except 
those which were purely political. Thus they 
make the whole transaction a splendid political 
affair ; as though the divine Being had no 
higher object in view than to make the natural 
posterity of Abraham a grand national success ! 
On the contrary, it is obvious enough that 
even the political aspects of the covenant and 
promises were for ultimate spiritual purposes. 
They were called out from Ur of Chaldea, made 
to sojourn in a strange land, were finally settled 
in Canaan, isolated from the neighboring na- 
tions, and bound together by ordinances of 
divine appointment, differing essentially from 
those of any other people, for purposes which 
were chiefly spiritual ; that the blessing of God 
might come on them, and through them upon 
'' all the families of the earth " — to the Jew first, 
and also to the Gentile. Had the Jew special 
advantages, or was there profit in circumcision } 
Yes, *'much every way, chiefly because that 



The Church — its Organization. 27 

unto them were committed the oracles of God." 
And these oracles are '^profitable for doctrine, 
for reproof, for correction, for instruction in right- 
eousness : that the man of God may be perfect, 
thoroughly furnished unto all good works." 

God's requirements^ also, of Abraham and his 
seed were such as only a spiritual people could 
comply with. '' I am the Almighty God ; walk 
before me, and he thou perfect!' His p7'omises 
also were applicable only to such. " I will be a 
God unto thee and to thy seed after thee." He 
does not say, I will be a sovereign unto thee, 
etc., to be supported and served ; but a God, to 
be loved and worshiped. And, correlatively, 
they were called the people of God, or his people. 
"■ And the Lord said, I have surely seen the af- 
fliction of my people which are in Egypt, and 
have heard their cry." Exod. iii, 7. '* Comfort 
ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God." Isa. 
xl, I. *' Bv faith Moses . . . refused to be called 
the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather 
to suffer affliction with the people of God,'' etc. 
Heb. xi, 24, 25. 

''In blessing I will bless thee." This prom- 
ise has reference, doubtless, in part to Abra- 
ham's personal justification by faith. Early in 
the history of God's intercourse with him, it is 



28 Infant Baptism. 

said, " He believed in the Lord, and he counted it 
to him for righteoicsnessr The faith of Abra- 
ham is set forth in the Scriptures as the pattern 
of the faith of the Church in all ages, and his 
justification as a pledge of like justification to 
all that exercise like precious faith. Paul says, 
*' It" (his faith) "was imputed to him for right- 
eousness. Now it was not written for his sake 
alone, that it was imputed to him ; but for us 
also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on 
him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead." 
The *' token of the covenant " received by 
Abraham and his posterity was not the sign 
and seal of any secular obligation on the part 
of either party of the covenant, but of the right- 
eous character which pertains to the people of 
God in all ages. " He received the sign of cir- 
cumcision, a seal of the rigkteous7tess of the 
faith which he had yet being uncircumcised : 
that he might be the father of all them that be- 
lieve, though they be not circumcised ; that 
righteousness might be imputed unto them also." 
Every chaj^acteristic that attaches essentially to 
the Church of God, as defined by theologians, 
appertained pre-eminently to the Abrahamic 
people, when God had placed upon them the 
token of his covenant, i. They were ''a body 



The Church — its Orgajiization. 29 

of people separated from the world for the service 
of Godr Abraham was called out from his 
country and kindred, and his seed sojourned in 
a strange land. They were isolated from all other 
people during their entire history, that they 
might not learn the ways of idolatrous nations, 
but devote themselves to the service of Jehovah. 
" Thou art a holy people unto the Lord thy 
God : the Lord thy God hath chosen thee to 
be a special people unto himself, above all peo- 
ple that are upon the face of the earth. The 
Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose 
you, because ye were more in number than any 
people ; for ye were the fewest of all people : 
but because the Lord loved you, and because he 
would keep the oath which he had sworn unto 
your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out 
with a mighty hand and redeemed you out of 
the house of bondage. . . . Thou shalt therefore 
keep the commandments, and the statutes, and 
the judgments, which I command thee this day, 
to do them." Deut. vii, 6-1 1. 2. They observed 
" ordinances of divine appointment^ " Every 
man child among you shall be circurncised. . . . 
It shall be a token of the covenant between me 
and you. . . . My covenant shall be /;/ j/<;'?/r^^i-A 
for an everlasting covenant. And the uncir- 



30 Infant Baptism. 

cumcised man child whose flesh of his foreskin 
is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off 
from his people ; he hath broken my covenant." 
Gen. xvii, 10-14. 

The ordinances of circumcision and the pas- 
chal Slipper correspond with those of baptism 
and the Lord's supper in the present dispensa- 
tion. But I will not multiply arguments in 
proof that God organized a CImixh with Abra- 
ham. The fact is too plain to need it. 

It only remains for me to state that the 
names by which the Scriptures designate the 
Jewish people are those by which the Church is 
known in every age. They are called House of 
Israel. "The vineyard of the Lord of hosts is 
the house of Israel." Isa. v, 7. House of God. 
*' Having a high-priest over the house of God." 
Heb. X, 2 1. Zion. "The Lord shall comfort Zion." 
Isa. li, 3. The Church. " I will declare thy name 
unto my brethren : in the midst of the congj^ega- 
tion will I praise thee." Psa. xxii, 22. St. Paul, 
quoting this passage in Heb. ii, 12, says : " I will 
declare thy name unto my brethren : in the midst 
of the Church will I sing praise unto thee." St. 
Stephen (Acts vii, 37, 38) says, " This is that 
Moses, which said unto the children of Israel, a 
Prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto 



The Church — its Organizatiojt, 31 

you of your brethren, like unto me ; him shall 
ye hear. This is he that was in the Chu7rh in 
the wilderness with the angel which spake to 
him in the mount Sinai." 

The Hebrew people, therefore, possessed the 
name and character of the Church. And as it 
is acknowledged by all that there was no or- 
ganized and visible Church prior to the call of 
Abraham and the covenant made with him, it 
follows that God instituted his visible Church 
with that patriarch, who, in Romans iv, 11, is 
called *' the father of all them that believe." 



32 Infant Baptism. 



CHAPTER III. 

THE CHURCH ; ITS IDENTITY IN THE JEWISH 
AND CHRISTIAN DISPENSATIONS. 

§ I . Statement of the Subject. 

WE come now to a very important point in 
the discussion of the subject of infant 
baptism, namely, the identity of the Church, or 
the essential sameness of the visible Church of 
God in all ages and under all dispensations. It 
is acknowledged by both parties (those that prac- 
tice and those that oppose infant baptism) to be 
difficult to defend the practice of excluding in- 
fants from the Church, and hence from baptism, 
its initiatory rite, if we admit the identity of the 
Christian Church with the Jewish, into which 
God placed infants of believers by positive 
institution.* 

Hence it becomes a question of the highest 

* God made infants members of the covenant, that is, of 
the Church, by virtue of being children of behevers, and not 
by receiving circumcision. Circumcision was not the institu- 
tion, or the constitution of the membership of children born 
within the pale of the Church, but the recognition of it. " The 
uncircumcised man child whose flesh of his foreskin is not 



Identity of tlie Church, 33 

moment, in the investigation of the subject, 
whether the doctrine of the Church's identity be 
settled beyond quibble or controversy. Either 
the Church which now exists, and is recognized 
by all as the Christian Church, is the same that 
existed in the days of the patriarchs and proph- 
ets, or it is 7tot, If it be conceded that the 
Church of the apostles under the Messiah is 
not the same with that of the prophets under 
the divine leadership of the preceding dispensa- 
tion, then one of the main pillars in support 
of the doctrine of infant baptism is taken away. 
Thus it is understood by all parties. All anti- 
Pedobaptist Churches, so far as I know, take 
the ground that the Jewish and Christian 

circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people ; " (the 
congregation of the Lord ;) " he hath broken my covenant." 
Genesis xvii, 14. Notice, he could " break the covenant," 
and be " cut off from his people," though he be *' not circM7ii' 
cisedP Hence, independent of circumcision, he was a mem- 
ber of his people, and a party to the covenant. Hence, also, 
the neglect of it on the part of the parents for the child, and 
then the neglect on the part of the child, when he should come 
to years, would bring upon him the awful penalty of excision 
from the Church of God, upon the charge of having broken 
the covenant. 

By virtue, then, not of having received circumcision, but of 
the promise of God, confirmed by the oath, to be a God " unto 
thee and thy seed,'' the children with their parents were a 
party in the covenant. 
5 



34 Infant Baptism. 

Churches are in no sense identical. Those of 
them that hold that there was a visible Church 
organization proper prior to Christ's coming, 
teach (if they teach any thing on the subject) 
that at that time it was disorganized and its 
ranks disbanded, and that Christ proceeded to 
construct a new Church, having no essential 
connection with any organization which had 
preceded it. 

On the other hand, all Pedobaptists main- 
tain that at the coming of Christ the Church of 
God was transferred from the former dispensa- 
tion to the present ; or, that it emerged from 
a state of comparative darkness and obscurity, 
which characterized the preceding age, into 
the fuller light of a more glorious dispensation ; 
or, which is the same thing, that our Lord 
revealed the more abundant measure of the 
divine Spirit and influence of gospel truth in 
the same Church. The following, from the pen 
of a master, is indorsed with the heartiest as- 
sent : '' At the coming of the Messiah there 
was not one Church taken away and another 
set up in its room ; but the Church continued 
the same, in those that were the children-of 
Abraham, according to the faith. It is common 
with divines to speak of the Jewish and the 



Statement of the Subject. 35 

Christian Churches as tliough they were two 
distinct and totally difierent things ; but that is 
not a correct view of the matter. The Chris- 
tian Church is not another Church, but the 
very same that was before the coming of Christ, 
having the same faith with it, and interested in 
the same covenant. Great alterations, indeed, 
Vv^ere made in the outward state and condition of 
the Church by the coming of the Messiah. The 
carnal privilege of the Jews, in their separation 
from other nations to give birth to the Messiah, 
then failed, and with that also their claim on 
that account to be the children of Abrahami. 
The ordinances of worship suited to that state 
of things then expired and came to an end. 
New ordinances of worship were appointed, 
suitable to the new light and grace which were 
then bestowed upon the Church. The Gen- 
tiles came into the faith of Abraham along 
with the Jews, being made joint partakers with 
them in his blessing. But none of these things, 
nor the whole collectively, did make such an 
alteration in the Church but that it v/as still 
one and the same. . . . The ChurcJi is, and ahvays 
was, one and the santeT — Watson 's Dicttonaiy, 
p. 241. The case being thus stated, I hesitate 
not to affirm my most assured confidence in 



36 Infant Baptism. 

the Church's identity, and shall proceed to 
demonstrate the same by proofs drawn from 
the Scriptures. 



§ 2. Identity of the Church — Scriptural Argument. 

We have already seen that there was an or- 
ganization in the dispensation before Christ 
came, called in the Scriptures " The Church." 
Those who teach that that Church passed away, 
was destroyed, or in some way came to an end, 
at or before the advent of our Lord, have failed 
to bring a solitary Scripture passage to prove 
their position. If an event ever transpired so 
remarkable as the abolition and annihilation of 
the Church, over which for nineteen hundred 
years the divine Being had manifested such pa- 
rental tenderness, and with which he had borne 
with exhaustless patience ; certainly, it would 
seem, there should be some indication of it 
somewhere in the Scriptures. Some sacred seer 
had foretold it, or some inspired historian had 
recorded it. Some weeping Jeremiah had dis- 
closed its foreboding shadow, as it hung dark 
over the prospects of a doomed Church. But 
we look in vain for any such indication. No 
passage is found that teaches the doctrine. If 



Identity of the Clucreli. ^y 

there be any such passage, where is it to be 
found ? 

Again : No passage in the New Testament 
teaches that Christ or his apostles organized, 
or that Christ directed the apostles to organize, 
a iiew CJunxh. If any affirm the contrary let 
them produce the passage, or tell us where it 
can be found. If any New Testament script- 
ure be susceptible of such an interpretation, 
it must be the commission to evangelize the 
world, (Mark xvi, 15, 16,) ''Go ye into all the 
world, and preach the Gospel to every creature. 
He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved ; 
but he that believeth not shall be damned." 
On this passage let it be noted : — 

I. It gives direction to preach the Gospel ; 
but this w^as not new. The Gospel had been 
preached to Abraham nineteen hundred years 
before. It was a part of the covenant promise 
given to him when the Church was instituted 
with that patriarch. *' And the Scripture, fore- 
seeing that God w^ould justify the heathen 
through faith, preached befoj^e the Gospel zinto 
Abraham, saying, In thee shall all nations be 
blessed!' Gal. iii, 8. Here we learn, not only that 
the Gospel v/as preached unto Abraham, but that 
the very covenant promise of a Saviour zvas itself 



38 Infant Baptism. 

the Gospel. And this same Gospel was preached 
to the subsequent generations of Abraham's 
natural posterity. On this point St. Paul is ex- 
plicit : " Unto tis was the Gospel preached, as 
well as unto them:'' (the Jews that fell through 
unbehef:) ''but the word preached did not profit 
them, not being mixed with faith in them that 
heard it." The apostolic commission to preach 
the Gospel to the world was not, therefore, a 
commission to do some new thing, much less 
to organize a new Church; but to perpetuate 
the work which had been going on for cent- 
uries. 

2. There was, indeed, something new in this 
apostolic commission. It was a new thing to 
preach the Gospel to " every creattire',' to '* all 
nations!' For nearly twenty hundred years the 
peculiar privileges and blessings of the Church 
had been confined to the house and lineage of 
Abraham. But now the " middle wall of par- 
tition" between them and "all nations" was 
" broken down," and the blessings of the cove- 
nant were to flow freely to " every creature," 
and myriad millions of them were to be gath- 
ered under the lengthening cords of Jehovah's 
pavilion. 

The Prophet Isaiah, in language addressed 



Scriptural Argument. 39 

to the desponding Church of his time, had pre- 
dicted the ingathering of the Gentiles into her 
ranks in the following strain : *' Sing, O barren, 
thou that didst not bear ; break forth into sing- 
in 2:, and crv aloud, thou that didst not travail 
with child ; for more are the children of the 
desolate than the children of the married wife, 
saith the Lord. Enlarge the place of thy tenty 
and let them stretch fo7'th the curtains of thine 
habitations : spare not, lengthen thy cords, and 
st7'engthen thy stakes ; for thou shalt break forth 
on the right hand and on the left ; and thy seed 
shall inlierit the Gentiles!' 

The apostles, in extending the commission 
that Christ had given them, were enlarging 
the place of the tent, stretching forth the cur- 
tains of the habitations, lengthening the cords, 
and strengthening the stakes preparatory to 
the breaking forth of the Gentiles, who, though 
they had been '' far off," were now " made nigh 
by the blood of Christ," and about to become 
" fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the 
household of God." 

3. This apostolic commission contained an- 
other new theory. Instead of the painful and 
bloody rite of circumcision being the "token 
of the covenant," the sign of recognition of 



40 Infant Baptism. 

Church membership, baptism was now, and 
henceforth, to be "the token of the covenant" 
relation to God, and of the enjoyment of his 
favor — the sign of recognition of membership 
in the Church. From the days of Abraham 
to the hour in which Christ gave his commis- 
sion to the apostles, no man had entered the 
Church of God without circtimcision, Christ, 
John the Baptist, the apostles, and all the faith- 
ful, had received it. But from that hour, and 
ever henceforth, all must take their place in the 
ranks of the Church by the rite of baptism. 
And from the hour of giving this commission 
to the apostles, circumcision (except for the 
prejudice, blindness, and slowness of perception 
of the converted Jews it be tolerated for awhile) 
must be laid aside. Here, then, our Saviour 
instituted the ordinance of Christian baptism to 
take the place and answer the purposes (so far 
as these were to be perpetuated) of circumcision. 
This point, I am aware, has been denied by 
opposers of infant baptism. But how absurd 
and useless to deny a truth so obvious and in- 
evitable. A person might as well deny that 
the Christian sacrament of the Lord's supper 
has succeeded to and taken the place of the 
Jewish passover, as to deny that Christian bap- 



Scriptural Argimtent. 41 

tism succeeds to and takes the place of circum- 
cision. 

The apostolic commission, then, gave no au- 
thority to organise a new Church. It extended 
the covenant promises and privileges of the 
Church to '' all nations." These, for centuries, 
had been the peculiar and exclusive inheritance 
of the Jewish people, when the Gentiles were 
"aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and 
strangers from the covenants of promise," but 
now they were to be " no more strangers and 
foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, 
and of the household of God." T^a^ form of the 
" token of the covenant " was thus changed from 
a painful and bloody rite to an ordinance more 
in harmony with the spirit of a more merci- 
ful and less burdensome dispensation. Where, 
then, I ask, is the authority which authorizes 
the belief that God, at the coming of Christ, 
disbanded his ancient Church, his covenant 
people, and organized a new Church having no 
necessary connection with, nor dependence 
upon, his covenant engagement with Abraham ? 
Not in the Scriptures, surely. Every Scripture 
assumption even touching this immediate sub- 
ject repudiates such a position. If, then, there 
be no Scripture passage which teaches either 



42 Infant Baptism. 

the one or the other of these things, the doc- 
trine must rest on the sheerest assumption of 
its advocates. 

I shall endeavor now to show, that the won- 
derful position taken by the opposers of infant 
baptism being without Scripture warrant, is not 
only a groundless assumption, but is in direct 
opposition to the plain teachings of the Bible. 

I. The nature and cJiaracter of the covenant 
that God made with Abraham, when he organ- 
ized with him the visible Church, precludes the 
idea and the possibility of its being dissolved, 
and the Church thereby becoming disorganized 
and disbanded, while the world stands, human 
probation continues, or eternity itself endures. 

I. It is called (Gen. xvii, 7) ''an everlasting 
cove7ia7it :'' ''I will establish my covenant be- 
tween me and thee and thy seed after thee in 
their generations, for an everlasting covenant, 
to be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee." 
Here, ^*thy seed after thee," signifies not only 
them who are of the circumcision, but also all 
who "■ walk in the steps of that faith of our father 
Abraham, which he had being uncircumcised. 
For the promise, that he should be the heir of 
the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, 
through the law, but through the righteousness 



Church Idejitity — Nature of the Covenant, 43 

of faith ; " and consequently to all tJie people of 
God in all subsequent ages — to all believe7^s. 
Thus Paul to the Galatians, (iii, 29,) "And if ye 
be Christ's, then are ye Abrahams seed, and 
heirs according to the promise." The Psalmist 
says, "He hath remembered, his covenant /^r- 
ever, the word which he commanded to a thort- 
sa7td generations. Which covenant he made with 
Abraham, and his oath unto Isaac ; and con- 
firmed the same unto Jacob for a law, and to 
Israel for an everlasting covenant!' Psa. cv, 8-10. 
Paul to the Hebrews (xiii, 20) says : " Now the 
God of peace, that brought again from the 
dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of 
the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting 
covenant!' 

Here, the blood of Jesus is called " the blood 
of the everlasting covenant." Whence we may 
learn that Christ's atonement entered into and 
made part of the " everlasting covenant " made 
with Abraham. Hence it follows, that so long 
as there is a soul to be saved or blessed, 
on earth or in heaven, through the blood of 
Jesus, which is " the blood of the everlasting 
covenant," just so long will this covenant con- 
tinue in force. 

2. This covenant contained three great pro^nises. 



44 Infant Baptism. 

(a.) A numerous seed, natural and spiritual. 
Abraham's ^' seed " were to be as numerous as 
*' the sla7^s of heaven," as " the sc77id upon the 
seashore/' as " the diisl of the earth." He was 
to be "the father of many nations." This was 
to be fulfilled in part in his natural posterity, but 
more amply and especially in his spiritual'* seed/' 
for he, Abraham, is ''the father of all them that 
believe ; " " the father of us all." Rom. iv. 

(d.) The land of Caitaan ; the type and the 
antitype ; the earthly and the heavenly. His 
natural seed occupied the typal Canaan about 
fifteen centuries. And all the faithful will in- 
herit the a7ititypal Canaan forever, by virtue of 
being redeemed by " the blood of the everlast- 
ing covenant." Hence the long line of heirs 
immortal chant the happy chorus :— 

" Canaan, bright Canaan, 

I am bound for the land of Canaan ; 

Canaan, it is my happy home, 

I am bound for the land of Canaan." 

Abraham personally had no inheritance in 
the typal Canaan ; '' no, not so much as to set 
his feet on." Acts vii, 5. Indeed, he was obliged 
to purchase a burial-place therein for his loved 
Sarah. Gen. xxiii. "By faith he sojourned in 
the land of promise, as in a strange country^ 



Nature of the Covenant — '' Everlasting!* 45 

dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the 
heirs with him of the same promise : for he looked 
for a city which hath foundations, [twelve, gar- 
nished with all manner of precious stones — Rev. 
xxi, 14-19 — in the antitypal Canaan,] whose 
builder and maker is God. . . . These . . . con- 
fessed that they were strangers and pilgrims 
on the earth. . . . But now they desire a better 
coiLfitiy, that is, a heavefily!' Heb. xi, 9, 13, 16. 

(r.) The Messiah and Savionr. The third 
and greatest covenant promise to Abraham and 
his seed was that of a Saviour^ Christ. *' In 
thee shall all families of the earth be blessed!' 
Gen. xii, 3. " Abraham shall surely become a 
great and mighty nation, and all the nations of 
the earth shall be blessed in him!' Gen. xviii, 18. 
" In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be 
blessed!' Gen. xxii, 18. 

Peter, on the day of Pentecost, (Acts iii, 
25, 26!) says to the disobedient Jews, "Ye are 
the children of the prophets, and of the cove- 
nant which God made with our fathers, saying 
unto Abraham, And in thy seed shall all the 
kindreds of the earth be blessed. Unto you 
first, God having raised up his Son yesns sent 
him to bless you, in turning away every one of 
you from his iniquities." Here, the apostle in- 



4-6 Infant Baptism. 

terprets the promise, to all ''families/' " nations," 
and " kindreds " of the earth, of being *' blessed^^ 
to be fulfilled in the gift and sending of " his 
Son Jesus ;'' and the 7node of blessing them, to 
consist in " turning away every one of you from 
his iniquities." 

Paul also explains : *' In thee shall all nations 
be blessed. So then they which be of faith are 
blessed with faithful Abraham. (Gal. iii, 8, 9.) 
Now to Abraham and his seed were the prom- 
ises made. He saith not. And to seeds^ as of 
many ; but as of one. And to thy seed, which 
is Christ!' Ver. 16. 

The covenant, therefore, embraces these three 
promises, and by virtue of each of them it is, 
and must ever be, what it is styled in the Script- 
ure, "The Everlasting Covenant." In the 
nature of the case, neither the covenant nor the 
promises thereof can ever be annulled, inval- 
idated, or in any respect or degree rendered 
ineffectual or void while time shall last or eter- 
nity endure. But the formation of this cove- 
nant IS ITSELF the organisation of the Chmxh, 
Its promises, on the part of the divine Being, 
in connection with the fulfillment of their stip- 
ulated conditions on the part of Abraham and 
his seed, co^istitiite the very warp and woof of 



The Covenant can Never be Annulled. 4/ 

the ancient Church institute. If this be not 
evident at once, it will appear upon a little re- 
flection. The covenant, as we have seen, con- 
sisted on the one part in making and confirm- 
ing three great promises ; and on the other part, 
in observing the conditions upon which these 
promises were made. These conditions were: 
First. Faithful adherence to the Lord as their 
God: "I will establish my covenant between me 
and thee, ... to be a 6^^^ unto thee." Sec -nd. 
Faithful service to him as a religious people : 
*' Walk before me, and be thou perfect." Third. 
Faithful observance of the rite of circumcision^ 
which was a badge of distinction, and pledge 
of separation from the world : " Every man child 
among you shall be circumcised.'' 

Every person must see that the covenant thus 
made and ratified between the parties, is the 
very essence of the visible Church organization ; 
and that these must stand or fall together. 

Can the visible Church, therefore, constituted 
nearly forty centuries ago, be abolished } Not 
while there is a soul to be saved, through the 
blood of the Crucified ; not while there is a glo- 
rified saint to enjoy the inheritance incorrupt- 
ible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, through 
the virtue of the same shed blood. " The blood 



48 Infant Baptism. 

of the everlasting covenant," will be celebrated 
in heaven by untold millions, who will sing, 
** Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive 
power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, 
and honor, and glory, and blessing ; ... for 
thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God 
by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, 
and people, and nation." The blood of this 
same everlasting covenant is the foundation of 
the sinner's hope, and of the song of the re- 
deemed in glory ; and " if the foundations be 
destroyed, what can the righteous do V 

The above facts and arguments, founded on 
the nature of the Abrahamic covenant, are re- 
garded as demonstration complete of the iden- 
tity of the Church of God in all ages. Never- 
theless, other facts and other arguments, drawn 
from other aspects of the case, will now be pre- 
sented. 

II. We have the direct testimony of St. Paul, 
to the effect that the Abrahamic covenant can- 
not be disamtulled, since God remains faithful 
to his promise and his oath : '' When God made 
promise to Abraham, because he could swear 
by no greater, he sware by himself, saying. 
Surely, blessing, I will bless thee, and multiply- 
ing, I will multiply thee. And so, after he had 



Tlie Covenant can Never be Disannulled. 49 

patiently endured, he obtained the promise. 
For men verily swear by the greater ; and an 
oath for confirmation is to them an end of all 
strife. Wherein God, willing more abundantly 
to show unto the heirs of promise the immicta- 
bility of his counsel, [promise,] confirmed it hy 
an oath : that by two immntable things ^ [the prom- 
ise and the oath,] in which it was impossible for 
God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, 
who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the 
hope set before us : which hope we have as an 
anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and 
which entereth into that within the vail ; whither 
the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made 
a high-priest forever after the order of Melchiz- 
edek." Heb. vi, 13-20. 

"Which hope we,' "heirs of the promise," 
Christians of all ages, ''have!' "Entereth into 
that within the vail "— -extendeth to the heavenly 
inheritance. Why? Because " when God made 
promise to Abraham he confirmed it by an oath!' 
That is, OUR hope of heaven is founded on God's 
covenant promise to Abraham, which he con- 
firmed by an oath. The Abrahamic covenant, 
therefore, is not, and, since "it is impossible 
for God to lie,'' ca^i never be, disannulled. 

In the same manner, with a little variation 

7 



50 Infant Baptism. 

of terms, the same apostle discourses to the 
Galatians, (iii, 13-18,) ''Christ hath redeemed 
us from the curse of the law, being made a 
curse for us : . . . that the blessing of Abraham 
might come on the Gentiles through Jesus 
Christ ; that we might receive the promise of 
the Spirit through faith. Brethren, I speak 
after the manner of men ; Though it be but a 
ma7is covenant, yet if it be confirmed, no. man 
disannnlleih, or addeth thereto. Now to Abra- 
ham and his seed were the promises made. 
He saith not, And to seeds, as of many ; but 
as of one. And to thy seed, which is Christ. 
And this I say, that the covenant, that was 
confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which 
was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot 
DISANNUL, that it should make the promise of 
none effect. For if the inheritance be of the 
law, it is no more of promise : but God gave it 
to Abraham by promise." 

The apostle's reasoning runs thus : The cove- 
nant that was confirmed of God in Christ, to 
Abraham and his seed, four hundred and 
thirty years before the giving of the law at 
Sinai, cannot be disannulled by that law, 
nor, by parity of reasoning, by any other thing, 
since no man can disannul, or add to, a covenanty 



The Covenant Can Never be Disannulled. 5 1 

^' though it be but a man's/' provided it be con- 
firmed. Or, 

His argument may be set forth in this state- 
ment : Since no man can disannul^ or add to ^ a 
covenant^ in case it be confirmed^ " though it be 
but a man's covenant ; " then surely the cove- 
nant with Abraham a7id his seed, which " was 
confirmed before of God in Christ," four hun- 
dred and thirty years before the giving of the 
law at Sinai, cannot be disannulled by the 
law ; nor, by parity of reasoning, by any thing 
else. 

That the Abrahamic covenant embraced 
Christ, and all blessings through him, is plain, 
not only from the fact that Paul explains " the 
seed " to signify Christ ; but also from the fact 
that '' Christ hath redeemed us from the curse 
of the law, being made a curse for us, that the 
blessing of Abraham might C07ne on the Gentiles 
through Jesus Christ!' 

But, as the formation and confirmation of 
this covenant, which cannot be disannulled, is 
the organization of the Church, it follows that 
the latter has not been, and will not be, dis- 
solved. This is the second demonstration of 
the same thing. 

III. The Church, in both dispensations, exhibits 



52 Infant Baptism. 

marks of identity^ and inherits the same cha}^- 
acteristics. In both it has gladly recognized 
the same Sovereign Ruler, Mediator, sanctify- 
ing Spirit ; the same doctrine of atonement, 
moral law, justification by faith, regeneration, 
resurrection of the dead, future rewards and pun- 
ishments — in fine, the same doctrines through- 
out, as are embraced in the plan of redemption 
and developed in the Gospel. These doctrines 
are, indeed, more fully revealed to, and more 
fully apprehended by, the Church in these days ; 
this is what characterizes the Christian dispen- 
sation, and constitutes its excellence. But they 
all were more or less fully taught and developed 
in the Church of the Mosaic dispensation. 

In both dispensations, also, the Church is 
known by the same appellations. God calls 
them his "people,"' his "sheep," his "vine," his 
"vineyard," his *' elect," his "chosen," his "own," 
his " children," his " sons and daughters," his 
" house," his " household," the " house of Jacob," 
(Luke i, 33,) " house of Israel, and house of 
Judah," (Heb. viii, 8,) " Zion," "The Church." 

In both, also, the Church contains the same 
individuals in membership. Jesus, John the 
Baptist, James the son of Zebedee, John, An- 
drew, Philip, Thomas, James the son of Alpheus, 



Similar Characteristics, 53 

Thaddeus, Simon, etc., etc. We never hear of 
any of these leaving the Church of the former 
dispensation to join that of the latter, as 
if they were separate and distinct Churches. 
Nor do we hear of the Church of the former 
going to dissolution while its members continue 
in the faith ; nor of its members abandoning 
the Church in which they had held member- 
ship to organize a new one ; which, indeed, is 
not a new, but one possessing the same cliaracter- 
istics, names, and members, as before. 

While in both dispensations the Church is 
thus identical in name and nature, in indi- 
vidual membership, and acknowledges divine 
proprietorship, and this is all the identity con- 
tended for, it is difficult to conceive in what 
respect or sense the Church can be not iden- 
tical. For no matter how much its legislation 
may have been improved in passing from a 
condition comparatively dark and gloomy to 
one more luminous and glorious, such a transi- 
tion could not invalidate its organization, nor 
abrogate its covenant promises, to those who 
repose faith in them. 

If the State should contain one half the 
marks of identity which the Chtiixh exhibits, 
namely, identity of governing power and con» 



54 Infant Baptism. 

stitution, in its essential features, especially in 
its conditions of citizenship, its identity would 
not be questioned. Although its legislatures 
should continue annually to abolish, alter, and 
amend its laws and add others, it would still re- 
main the same political body. So in the Church. 
** What is the chief and only important differ- 
ence," asks Dr. Rice, " between the two dispen- 
sations } Under the former there was a code of 
ceremonial and civil laws adapted to the existing 
state of the Church ; which, after the death of 
Christ, gave place to a few simple ordinances 
adapted to the Church as about to be extended in 
her boundaries to all nations. . . . The civil and 
ceremonial laws were appointed by God for a 
specific purpose^ and for a limited time. So Paul 
teaches in Galatians, iii, 19 : ' Wherefore then 
serve th the law t It was added because of trans- 
gressions, till the seed should come to whom the 
promise was made! It was added because of 
transgressions ; it was designed to keep the 
Jews entirely distinct and separate from the 
pagans, that they might not be drawn away from 
their allegiance to God ; and it was to continue 
in force till Christ, the seed to whom the prom- 
ise was made, should come." — Campbell and 
Rice's Debate, p. 284. 



Jewish and Christian ClinrcJi One, 55 

- And now, because this civil and ceremonial 
code is abolished, are we to suppose the Church 
of God passed away with it ? The burdensome 
ceremonial of the Levitical law, so necessary 
to fill the divine purpose at the time, was the 
very thing which rendered it impossible that 
the Church should embrace the Gentile nations. 
But upon the death of Christ this civil and 
ceremonial code expired by limitation, and the 
apostles were now commissioned to go forth 
and offer to '^all nations " and " to every crea- 
ture '' the blessings " of the covenant, and the 
service of God, and the promises,'' which had 
through all the foregoing dispensation '' per- 
tained to the Israelites," and been confined ex- 
clusively to that people. 

§ 3. — Identity of the Church — Scriptural Arguments 

Continued, 

In varying the argument somewhat upon the 
subject, it may be necessary to remark: — 

I. That when intelhgent Pedobaptists speak 
of the Jewish Church and of the Christian Church, 
as they sometimes do, they do not wish to be 
understood as speaking of them as different 
and distinct Churches, which have no neces- 
sary relation to, connection with, or dependence 



56 Infant Baptism. 

upon each other, but as speaking of the same 
Church of God wxiA^x the different dispensations 
— Mosaic and Christian. 

Indeed, the phrases yewish Church and 
Christian Church are entirely foreign to the holy 
Scriptures, being nowhere found in them. Nor 
is such a form of words as the Church of Christ 
to be met with anywhere in the Bible. It is 
always the Church, or, the Church of God. 

It is not a little remarkable that, if the Church 
of the Abrahamic covenant began and ended its 
career in the earlier dispensation, there is not in 
the Scriptures some distinctive appellation by 
which this distinctive/^^:/ could be recognized, as 
yewish Church, Mosaic Church, or some other 
adjunct by which it could be more essentially 
described. Nor is it less remarkable, that, if 
the Church now subsisting began about the 
time of the Saviour's advent, and is, therefore, 
only co-extensive with the later dispensation, 
there is no inspired formulary designating this 
fact. On the other hand, it is a significant fact 
that, as we have seen, the Church of all ages is 
not only described as having the same charac- 
teristics, and serving the same purposes, but is 
designated by the same appellations. 

2. Abraham, by the authority of inspiration, 



Abmlunn Father of all Believers. 57 

is called '' the father" of all the members of the 
yewisJi CImrcli : " The father of circumcision." 
Rom. iv^, 12. In like manner, also, he is called 
the father of all the members of the Christian 
Chureh : '' The father of all them that believe." 
Rom. iv, II. ''The father of us all," Ver. 16. 
And, correlatively, all the members of the Chris- 
tian Church are called Abraham's children : ''If 
ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed.'' 
The Scriptures, therefore, place Abraham in 
precisely the same relation to the Christian, 
that he sustains to the yezvish, Church. This 
must be because they operate under, and are co- 
heirs of, the promised blessings of the same 
great Church charter — the Abrahamic covenant. 
The Churches are, therefore, ideiitical. 

If Abraham be not the father of the Christian 
Church, he does not lack much of it, being the 
father of all its members. Why is this f No 
other person — Moses, Noah, Daniel, Job — occupy 
any such relation to us. If we be Christ's, we are 
not, on such account, said to be Moses's seed, 
Noah's seed, etc. Why? Let Paul answer : "He 
received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the 
righteousness of the faith w^hich he had yet be- 
ing uncircumcised : that he might be the father 

of all them that believe, though they be not 

8 



S8 Infant Baptism. 

circumcised!' That is, he received circumcision 
— '' the token of the covenant " — that he might 
be the father of all Christian believers. Then 
they are in the same covenant obligation, and 
in the same Church with him. Is it not so 1 

3. Supposing the Jewish Church to have been 
abolished, somewhere about the time of the 
Saviour's advent, when, specifically, did its 
abolishment occur? Such an event must have 
constituted an epoch in the history of a Church 
which had existed nearly two thousand years, 
and had been the subject of a career more mar- 
velously eventful than any other organization 
known to mankind ! And if the Christian 
Church was commenced, as a separate and dis- 
tinct organization, at, or somewhere about, 
the time the Jewish Church was abolished, 
when, specifically, did that event occur f For 
the organization of a 7tew Church, destined to 
fill the whole earth, and increase in power, 
patronage, and splendor to the end of time, 
must have constituted an epoch ! Leave this 
thought for a moment and attend to another. 

AH anti-Pedobaptists will tell us, '' There 
were some things peculiar to the yewish Church 
which have no place in the Christian ; and 
other things peculiar to the Christian Church 



Passove7' a J^ezvish Ordmance, 59 

which had no place in the Jewish!' Granted : 
what things ? " Well, for example, the Jewish 
feast of the passovei^ which was never known 
to be observed in the Christian Church/' 
Granted. Well, what is there peculiar to the 
Christian Church ? " The celebration of the 
Lord's supper, which is to be observed by 
Christian believers to the end of time ; but 
not having been an institution of the Jewish 
Church, was not known in it." Granted. 

Let us attend now to a statement of the 
evangelist St. Luke, xxii, 7-20: '^Then came 
the day of unleavened bread, when the pass- 
over must be killed. And he sent Peter and John, 
saying, Go and prepare us the passover, that 
we may eat. And they said unto him, Where 
wilt thou that we prepare } And he said unto 
them. Behold, when ye are entered into the 
city, there shall a man meet you, bearing a 
pitcher of water; follow him into the house 
where he entereth in. And ye shall say unto 
the goodman of the house. The Master saith 
unto thee. Where is the guestchamber, where I 
shall eat the passover with my disciples } And 
he shall show you a large upper room furnished : 
there make ready. And they went, and found 
as he had said unto them : and they made ready 



6o Infant Baptism. 

the passover. And when the hour was come, 
he sat down, and the twelve apostles with him. 
And he said unto them. With desire I have de- 
sired to eat this passover with you before I 
suffer : for I say unto you, I will not any more 
eat thereof, until it be fulfilled in the kingdom 
of God. And he took the cup, and gave thanks, 
and said. Take this, and divide it among your- 
selves : for I say unto you, I will not drink of 
the fruit of the vine, until the kingdom of God 
shall come. And he took bread, and gave 
thanks, and brake it, and gave unto them, say- 
ing, This is my body which is given for you: 
this do in remembrance of me. Likewise also 
the cup after supper, saying. This cup is the 
new testament in my blood, which is shed for 
you." 

Also of St. Matthew, xxvi, 26-30 : " And as 
they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed 
it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and 
said, Take, eat ; this is my body. And he took 
the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, 
saying. Drink ye all of it ; for this is my blood 
of the new testament, which is shed for many 
for the remission of sins. But I say unto you, 
I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the 
vine, until that day when I drink it new with 



The Cliiirches Identical at Last Passover. 6i 

you in my Father's kingdom. And when they 
had sung a hymn, they went out into the Mount 
of Olives." 

{a) Here are members of the yewish Church 
celebrating for the last time the passover, an 
institution pecttliar to that Chttrch ; an ordi- 
nance which had been observed among them 
for fifteen hundred years. 

{b) ''As they were eating" the passover, 
Jesus took bread and wine, and instituted, and 
administered to his disciples, the Lord's supper, 
an ordinance peculiar to the Christian Church, 
and to be observed to the end of time. 

(^.) Now upon the hypothesis that the Jewish 
and Christian Churches are not ide^ttical, it fol- 
lows that, '' while they were eating " the pas- 
chal supper, and the Lord's supper, the Jewish 
Church was disbanded, and the Christian Church 
was organized ! For they could be eating the 
paschal supper only as members of the former ; 
and the Lord's supper only as members of the 
latter. 

{d) If this be so, when^ and by what transac- 
tion, were these things done } By what decree, 
or act, was the Jewish Church made to disap- 
pear and the Christian to spring into being } 
But upon the hypothesis that the Churches are 



62 Infant Baptism. 

identical, the explanation is simple and easy. 
Christ had only to displace an ordinance whose 
significance was about to pass away by another, 
the symbols of which should perpetuate the 
agony of the cross, and the mercy of God in 
our redemption. 

(^.) When Christ and his apostles sat down 
to eat that last passover, they were all members 
in good standing of the yewish Church. They 
had come into it by circumcision ; or more 
properly, at eight days of age they had each 
received *' the token of the covenant " in recog- 
nition of their membership in the Church of 
God. But, upon the supposition of the anti- 
Pedobaptists, when they rose up and retired 
they were members of an entirely different 
Church — the Christian — for the Saviour had ad- 
ministered, and the apostles had received, an 
ordinance never given or received out of the 
Christian Church. 

And how did they become dismembered from 
the Jewish Church ? They were not expelled iov 
unfaithfulness. They did not reti7'e by mutual 
consent of parties. How was it they were no 
longer members of the Church in which they 
had held membership so long .? And how did 
they get into, or become members of the Chris- 



The Chiirclies Identical at Last Passover. 6^ 

tian Cliurch ? They certainly did not receive 
Christian baptism I At the time of eating that 
last paschal supper Christian baptism had not 
been instituted. No command had been given 
to baptize in the name of the Father, Son, and 
Holy Ghost. Nor do we ever hear of one of 
the twelve receiving Christian baptism. The 
question still recurs, How did they become 
members of the Christian Church 1 Upon the 
supposition that the Churches are identical, the 
mystery disappears at once, and the whole sub- 
ject becomes luminous as the sun. Consist- 
ency is manifest in the whole transaction. The 
apostles had once received the '' token of the 
covenant," the sign of circumcision, by which 
they were recognized members of God's Church ; 
and now that baptism takes the place of circum- 
cision, they have no more need of receiving 
baptism than if they /^^^/been baptized. Thus, 
if we treat the subject as the Bible treats it, 
making no such distinction between the Jewish 
and Christian Churches as to make them sep- 
arate and distinct, and mutually to displace 
each other, but refer to them as the one " Church 
of God',' it becomes invested with consistency 
and harmony. 

(/.) If the apostles and converts to Chris- 



64 Infant Baptism. 

tianity were members of a new ChurcJi, after 
the crucifixion of our Lord, a Church distinct 
entirely from that of the old dispensation, it is 
marvelously strange that they did not knozv it. 
About twenty years after the crucifixion (in 
A. D. 52) Paul and Barnabas went all the way 
from Antioch in Syria to Jerusalem, and called 
a council of the apostles and elders, to consult 
as to whether they should continue the idte of 
circumcision in the Church : and doubtless up to 
that time all the yews converted to the Chris- 
tian religion had practiced circumcision in the 
case of their infant children, and, so far as we 
know, without the least objection on the part of 
the apostles. But how absurd all this would 
have been if they had had the remotest idea 
that the old Church (requiring circumcision) 
had been abolished, and a new one set up in its 
place ; unless, indeed, they had believed the 
Saviour to have instituted circumcision, as well 
as baptism, in the new Church. 

§ 4. The Church — Identity shown fro7n passages in the 
Old Testament Scriptures. 

The purpose of this section is to examine a 
few passages in the Old Testament Scriptures, 
showing the tenor of their teaching touching 



Old Testament P^vphecies. 65 

the subject under consideration — the identity of 
the Church. 

I. The first passage that is proposed for the 
purpose is found in Isaiah liv, 1-8 : '' Sing, O 
barren, thou that didst not bear ; break forth 
into singing, and cry aloud, thou that didst not 
travail with child : for more are the children 
of the desolate than the children of the married 
wife, saith the Lord. Enlarge the place of thy 
tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of 
thine habitations : spare not, lengthen thy cords, 
and strengthen thy stakes ; for thou shalt break 
forth on the right hand and on the left ; and 
thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles, and make 
the desolate cities to be inhabited. Fear not ; 
for thou shalt not be ashamed : neither be thou 
confounded ; for thou shalt not be put to shame : 
for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, 
and shalt not remember the reproach of thy 
widowhood any more. For thy Maker is thy 
husband ; the Lord of hosts is his name ; and 
thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel ; the 
God of the whole earth shall he be called. For 
the Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken 
and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth, when 
thou wast refused, saith thy God. For a small 
moment have I forsaken thee ; but with great 



66 Infant Baptism. 

mercies will I gather thee. In a little wrath I 
hid my face from thee for a moment ; but with 
everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, 
saith the Lord thy Redeemer." 

(a.) This is the address of the prophet to the 
Church of the Abrahamic covenant, more than 
seven centuries before the coming of the Mes- 
siah. And I desire the reader to turn to the 
passage and read the entire chapter, for it is full 
of promise of enlargement and future prosperity, 
assuring the Church that the divine kindness 
should not depart from her, neither should the 
*' covenant of peace" be removed. He com- 
pares her — under that dispensation confined 
within the narrow limits of Judea, and still more, 
to a small number of true believers — to a barren 
woman, " forsaken and grieved in spirit " and 
''' refused " of her husband, sitting in her tent, 
and, in her desolate condition, mourning the 
want of family and friends. 

(d.) His language to her is the very opposite 
to that which any sane man could possibly 
imagine it would have been, on the supposition 
that she was still to decline and pass av/ay, 
and give place to another, who, in her stead, 
should receive the wonderful promises of "the 
everlasting covenant," originally made to her. 



Cdd Testament PropJiecies, 67 

Mark the terms of the covenant made with this 
Church, this now '' barren " and '' desolate," 
*' forsaken and grieved " woman : " I will per- 
form the oath which I sware unto Abraham 
thy father ; and I will make thy seed to multiply 
as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy 
seed all the countries ; and in thy seed shall all 
the nations of the earth be blessed." Gen. 
xxvi, 3, 4. ''Thy seed shall be as the dust of 
the earth ; and thou shalt spread abroad to the 
zvest, and to the easty to the norths and to the 
south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all 
the families of the earth be blessed." Gen. 
xxviii, 14. 

These promises unvail to the vision of the 
Church of the Abrahamic covenant a brilliant 
and boundless prospect, extending through the 
vista of all the coming future. And in this 
they comport well with the sublime and cheer-, 
ing^ address of the prophet. But the language 
of the covenant, and that of the prophet, are alike 
unintelligible and unaccountable if addressed to 
a Church w^hich is destined to wane until it 
passes away ; to decline and perish before its 
covenant promises scarcely begin to be realized ! 
No, no ; this prophetic address to the despond- 
ing Church is the most cheering and hopeful 



68 Infant Baptism. 

imaginable. ^' Sing, O barren, . . . cry aloud, 
thou that didst not travail with child I " Why ? 
" More are the children of the desolate than the 
children of the married wife, saith the Lord. 
Enlarge the place of thy tent, and let them 
stretch forth the curtains of thine habitations : 
spare not, lengthen thy cords, and strengthen 
thy stakes ! " Why ? "' Thou shalt break forth 
on the right hand and on the left ; and thy seed 
shall inherit tJie Gentiles!' 

" The conversion of the Gentiles," says Adam 
Clarke, (Comment in loc.^ "is all along consid- 
ered by the prophet as a new accession of 
adopted children, admitted into the original 
Church of God, and united with it." But can 
the reader tell me how these promises could 
have been fulfilled ; how and when this ancient 
Church " inherited " such an accession of 
adopted Gentile children, if, forsooth, this spouse 
of " the Holy One of Israel " became, before 
the coming of the Lord, as the children of 
Rachel t 

2. Isaiah lix, 20, 21 : "And the Redeemer 
shall come to Zion, and unto them that turn 
from transgression in Jacob, saith the Lord. 
As for me, this is my covenant with them, saith 
the Lord ; My Spirit that is upon thee, and 



Old Testatnent Pr:pliccics, 69 

my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall 
not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth 
of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed's 
seed, saith the Lord, from henceforth and for- 
ever." Isaiah Ix, 1-5: ''Arise, shine; for thy 
light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen 
upon thee. For, behold, the darkness shall cover 
the earth, and gross darkness the people : but 
the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory 
shall be seen upon thee. And the Gentiles shall 
come to thy light, and kings to the brightness 
of thy rising. Lift up thine eyes round about 
and see : . . . thy sons shall come from far, and 
thv daughters shall be nursed at thy side. Then 
thou shalt see, and flow together, and thine 
heart shall fear, and be enlarged ; because the 
abundance of the sea shall be converted unto 
thee, the forces of the Gentiles shall come unto 
thee." 

Look now carefully upon this remarkable 
passage. If the prophet in vision had seen the 
ancient Church open her arms to receive the 
Gentile tribes, ready and anxious to enter the 
inclosure, and had thus witnessed her increase 
in numbers and prosperity until the millennium, 
he could not have written in more animating 
terms, or better portrayed to us her happy 



70 Infant Baptism. 

condition. But how inexplicable his language 
upon any other hypothesis ; especially upon 
that of the anti-Pedobaptists, that this ancient 
Church organization was to become extinct at 
the coming of the " Redeemer to Zion." 

{a,) The prophet addresses the Church : 
'' The Redeemer shall come to Zzon, and unto 
them that turn from transgression in Jacob." 
Though it be yet seven hundred years before 
the Redeemer shall come, yet (such is the 
glory of the event) he animates and encourages 
her with the prospect. Thus also did Malachi, 
three hundred years later : *' The Lord whom 
ye seek shall suddenly come to his temple, 
even the Messenger of the covenant, whom ye 
delight in." But, lo ! it is a sad prospect for 
" Zion " if at that time she is to be dissolved, 
annihilated I But not so: *^ My Spirit that is 
upon thee, and my words which I have put in 
thy mouth, shall not depart oitt of thy mouth, nor 
out of tlie mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth 
of thy seed's seed, from henceforth and forever!' 
That is a glorious prospect for "Zion;" a 
thousand times better than annihilation ! 

{b) '* Arise, shine ; for thy light is come, and 
the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For, 
behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, ancj 



Old Testament Prophecies, 71 

gross darkness the people ; but the Lord shall 
arise upon thee." 

Here the prophet compares Zion, illuminated 
by the Spirit, to the sun rising in the Orient, and 
represents " the people " enveloped in the " gross 
darkness " of paganism and idolatry, as seeing 
her arrayed with the glory of the Lord. 

(c) " And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, 
and kings to the brightness of thy rising. Lift 
up thine eyes round about and see." How glo- 
rious is the vision of "Gentiles and kings" 
coming to Zion, resplendent with the Divine 
glory ! 

''All they gather themselves together, they 
shall come to theel' — Zion, Surely the prophet 
had his eye 011 the coming millennium. '^Thy 
sons shall come from far, and thy daughters 
shall be nursed at thy side." Yes, for they all 
are thy '* seed',' Jews or Gentiles. 

"Thou shalt see, and^^^ze; together!' Yea, by 
one Spirit are they all baptized into one body, 
whether they be Jews or Gentiles, whether they 
be bond or free, and have been all made to 
drink into one Spirit." i Cor. xii, 13. "And," 
Zion, " thine heart shall fear and be enlarged," 
(enough to take in all the Gentiles,) " because 
the abundance of the sea shall be converted 



^2 Infant Baptism. 

unto thee, and the forces of the Gentiles shall 
come unto thee." 

These prophetic utterances demonstrate un- 
mistakably the enlargement and prosperity of 
the Church of Isaiah's time, until the Gentiles 
and kings of the earth shall become the seed 
of Abraham ; until the sons coming from far, 
and the daughters that were far off, are brought 
nigh, and shall occupy a place within the pale 
of the Church ; until " the kingdoms of this 
world shall become the kingdoms of our Lord 
and of his Christ." And, as that happy state 
of things did not come in the former dispensa- 
tion, it follows that the same Church of God 
thus addressed by the prophet is yet to realize 
the fulfillment of these promises. 

§ 5. The Church — Its Identity shown frojn passages 
in the Neiv Testo.nient Scriptures. 

The New Testament Scriptures are outspoken 
and clear in regard to the identity of the Church 
in all ages ; and it would seem that none, with- 
out a cause to serve, would fail to see it and 
acknowledge it ; but, alas ! the inveteracy of 
prejudice and creed is not easy to be overcome, 
even by the power of truth itself. It bends and 
binds every thing to its darling theory, sparing 



New Testament Passages, 73 

not even the Holy Scriptures. In this section 
I shall call the reader's attention to four pas- 
sages which are clear and decisive respecting 
the question of Church identity. 

1. Hebrews iii, 1-6 : ^'Wherefore, holy breth- 
ren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider 
the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, 
Christ Jesus ; who was faithful to him that 
appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all 
his house. For this man was counted worthy 
of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who 
hath builded the house hath more honor than 
the house. For every house is builded by some 
man ; but he that built all things is God. And 
Moses verily was faithful in all his house as a 
servant, for a testimony of those things which 
w^ere to be spoken after ; but Christ as a Son 
over his own house ; whose house are we, if we 
hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the 
hope firm unto the end." 

The following is the comment of Professor 

Stuart on this passage : " Now Moses truly 

was faithful in all God's Church, as a servant ; 

but Christ as a Son over this same Church, 

which Church are we, provided we hold fast unto 

the end our confidence and joyful hope." 

The argument is brief but conclusive. 
10 



74 Infant BAPTis^r. 

{d.) It will not be disputed that " his house " 
in the text, "over" whieh God "appointed'* 
** Christ as a Son," and " in " whieh he employed 
*' Moses as a servant," siirnifies the CliurcJi. 

(/?.) All Christians eonstitute this Church. 
** Whose (Christ's) house are ziu\ if we hold 
fast the eonfidence and the rejoieing of the 
hope firm unto the end." 

(r.) Therefore, the Chureh in which Moses 
was servant, and over which Christ is Son and 
proprietor, is One Church. 

Or,. the argument may run thus : The Church 
of God is called, "his house." There is but 
one house spoken o\. In this house Moses was 
a servant, Jesus is a Son, and Christians are 
members. The Church oi God is one. 

2. Matthew xxi, 33-43 : " Hear another para- 
ble : There was a certain householder, which 
planted a vineyard, and hedged it round about, 
and digged a wine-press in it, and built a tower, 
and let it out to husbandmen, and went into a 
far country : and when the time o\ the fruit 
drew near, he sent his servants to the husband- 
men, that they might receive the fruits of it. 
And the husbandmen took his servants, and 
beat one, and killed another, and stoned an- 
other. Again, he sent other servants more 



Nciv Tcstmiicnt Passages. 75 

than the first : and they did unto them likewise. 
But last of all he sent unto them his son, say- 
ing, They will reverence my son. But when the 
husbandmen saw the son, they said among 
themselves, This is the heir ; come, let us kill 
him, and let us seize on his inheritance. And 
they caught him, and cast him out of the vine- 
yard, and slew him. When the lord therefore of 
the vineyard cometh, what will he do unto those 
husbandmen .^ They say unto him, He will mis- 
erably destroy those wicked men, and will let out 
his vineyard unto other husbandmen, which 
shall render him the fruits in their seasons. 
Jesus saith unto them, Did ye never read in the 
Scriptures, The stone which the builders re- 
jected, the same has become the head of the cor- 
ner : this is the Lord's doino;, and it is marvel- 
ous in our eyes } Therefore say I unto you, The 
kingdom of God* shall be taken from you, and giv- 
en to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof" 

(^2',) Let it be noted that vineyard, in verse 
33, and tlie kingdom of God, in verse 43, each 
signifies the Church. Mr. Watson, on verse 33, 
says, " A vineyard — The Jewish Church." 

{b.) Our Saviour did not tell the Jews that 
the CliurcJi which had been established among 
them so long should, with all its powers and 



76 Infant Baptism. 

privileges, be annihilated, and its covenant 
promises be abrogated ; but he assures them 
that it should be "taken from" them, and 
"given to" another nation, (race of people.) 
He speaks not of the Church being disorganized 
among the Jews, nor of its being organized 
among the Gentiles ; but of its transfer from 
the one to the other. The same Church has 
come into different hands. No language could 
make the case clearer. The proof is complete. 
Christ himself teaches that the Church, i7itact, is 
taken from the yews, and given to the Gentiles, 
3. Romans xi, 16-25 : "For if the first-fruit 
be holy, the lump is also holy : and if the root 
be holy, so are the branches. And if some of 
the branches be broken off, and thou, being a 
wild olive-tree, wert graffed in among them, 
and with them partakest of the root and fat- 
ness of the olive-tree ; boast not against the 
branches. But if thou boast, thou bearest not 
the root, but the root thee. Thou wilt say then, 
The branches were broken off, that I might be 
graffed in. Well; because of unbelief they 
were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be 
not high-minded, but fear : for if God spared not 
the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare 
not thee. Behold therefore the goodness and 



New Testament Passages, 'jy 

severity of God : on them which fell, severity ; 
but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in 
his goodness : otherwise thou also shalt be cut 
off. And they also, if they abide not still in 
unbelief, shall be graffed in : for God is able to 
graff them in again. For if thou wert cut out 
of the olive-tree which is wild by nature, and 
wert graffed contrary to nature into a good olive- 
tree ; how much more shall these, which be the 
natural branches, be graffed into their own olive- 
tree ? For I would not, brethren, that ye should 
be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be 
wise in your own conceit, that blindness in part 
is happened to Israel, until the fullness of the 
Gentiles be come in." 

The olive-tree in verse 1 7 (a figure borrowed 
from Jeremiah xi, i6) is generally, yes, uni- 
versally, understood by expositors and commen- 
tators to signify the Church of God. Of this, 
I think, there will be no denial, there can be 
no doubt. " Some of the branches — Jews, be- 
cause of their unbelief, are cut off from the 
blessings of the Church of God, The fatness 
of the olive-tree — The promises made to the 
patriarch, and the spiritual blessings of the 
yewish Churchy — Clarke. *^ It is from its 
beauty and richness that the apostle selects the 



;8 Infant Baptism, 

olive-tree as an emblem of the Chureh of God^ 
— JlViedon. "By the olive-tree we understand 
the visible Church of Gods" — Burkitt, 

(d,) Of this olive-tree — the Church — the Jews 
are called (verses 21, :'4) the natural branches, 

(d.) Some of them are said to be broken off 
through unbelief, (verses 17, JO,^ while others 
remain. 

{c.) The Gentiles are said to be graffcd in 
among the remaining Jews, and zuith them to 
** partake of the root and fatness of the olive- 
tree/' Verses 17, 19, 24. 

(if) If the Jews, that were broken off, abide 
not still in unbelief, it is said (verses 2'^, 24) 
they shall be graffed in again. 

(<:'.) When the Jews shall be graffed in again, 
(though it be a thousand years after Christ,) 
they will still be the natural braftches of their 
ozim olive-tree^ growing together with the Gen- 
tiles graffed into the same, \\mso 24. 

(/) But these things cannot possibly be true, 
unless the Jewish and Christian Churches are 
the sa?ne, 

4. Ephesians ii, 11-16, 19-22, and iii, 6: 
*' Wherefore remember, that ye being in time 
past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Un- 
circumcision by that which is called the Circum- 



N'czv Tcsta)}ic)it Passages. 79 

cision in the Hcsh made by hands ; that at that 
time ye were without Christ, being aliens from 
\\\Q covijno/izvai/th of Isracly and strangers from 
the covenants of promise, having no hope, and 
without God in the world : but now, in Christ 
Jesus, ye who sometime were far off arc made 
nigh bv the blood oi Christ. For he is our 
peace, who hath made both om\ and hath broken 
dozvn the middle ivall of partition betzveeii iis ; 
having abolished in his llcsh the enmity, even 
the law of commandments contained in ordi- 
nances ; for to make in himself of tivain one 
new man, so making peace ; and that he might 
reconcile botJi unto God /;/ one body by the cross, 
having slain the enmity thereby. Now there- 
fore ye are no more strangers and foreign- 
ers, but felknv-eiti::ens zvith the saints, and of 
the household of God ; and are built upon the 
foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus 
Christ himself being the chief corner-stone ; 
in whom all the building fitly framed together 
groweth unto a holy temple in the Lord : in 
whom ye also are builded together for a Iiabi- 
tation of God through the Spirit. . . . That the 
Gentiles should be fellozv-heirs, and of the same 
body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by 
the Gospel." 



8o Infant Baptism. 

In this wonderful passage, the Church of God 
is designated in a variety of verbal forms. 

{a) As distinguished from Gentilism under 
the earlier dispensation, it is called, '' The Cir- 
cumcision." Verse ii. 

{b) As that form to which the Ephesians, 
in common with other Gentiles, were aliens, it 
is designated by the phrase, " Commonwealth 
of Israel." Ver. 12. "They were aliens from 
the commonwealth of Israel: that is, they were 
not members of Christ's Churchy either visible or 
invisible." — Burkitt. 

{c) By implication, it is represented as an 
edifice, in which Christ, having " broken down 
the middle wall of partition between " Jews and 
Gentiles, " hath made both one!' Verse 14. 

{d) As that in which Christ ^^ reconciled 
both " Jews and Gentiles '* by the cross," it is 
set forth as one body. Verse 16. 

(e) As that to which, in the later dispensa- 
tion, the Gentiles "are no more strangers and 
foreigners," but in which they " are fellow-citi- 
zens with the saints ;" (God's ancient and cov- 
enanted people ; " that is," says Mr. Burkitt, 
" the patriarchs and prophets, and all other 
members of the Church of the Jews,") it is 
called, "The household of God." Verse 19. 



Neiv Testament Passages. 8 1 



^> 



{f) As a spacious and magnificent '' building, 
fitly fi-amed together," and extending across the 
lines of both dispensations, and in which the 
workmen of both — '' apostles and prophets '' — 
were engaged in laying its strong *' founda- 
tions," and also in which "Jesus Christ himself 
is the chief corner-stone," it is said to be, ^' A 
holy temple in the Lord!' Verses 20, 21. 

(^.) As a place of special spiritual illumina- 
tion, and union of Jews and Gentiles, it is 
called, " A habitation of God!' Verse 22. 

{h!) And, in view of the fact that "the Gen- 
tiles should be fellow-heirs with the saints " — 
patriarchs and prophets — and " of the covenant 
promise in Christ by the Gospel," it is de- 
clared to be, " The Same Body." Chapter 
iii, 6. 

If this remarkable passage does not demon- 
strate conclusively the Identity of God's visible 
Church from the days of Abraham to the end 
of the world, it is believed that no language 
can possibly indicate such demonstration. In 
each Scripture quotation in this section, the 
proof of the doctrine in question is regarded 
alike complete and unanszverable. 

Some one has somewhere said, substantially, 

what is here and now heartily indorsed ; that, 
11 



82 Infant Baptism. 

it is 7iot inore certain that a man, with increased 
stature, strength, knowledge, and zvisdom, is the 
SAME PERSON that he was when an infant, 
than it is that the Church, in this dispensation 
of increased light, knowledge, privilege, and expe- 
rience^ is the SAME Church which existed many 
centuries before, with a much less amount of 
light and experience. 

When the divine Being organized the visible 
Church, he placed the infants of believers in it 
as member's, and caused the public recognitio7i 
of their membership by express and positive en- 
act^nent ; placing upon them the sign of circum- 
cision — the ''token of the covenant." (See Gen. 
xvii, 9-14.) If, therefore, infants are not now to 
be regarded as members of the same Church of 
God, we require and demand the authority — 
the law as express and positive — showing the 
groimd of their dismemberment. It will not do 
to say, " Many things are changed in this dis- 
pensation, and infants are no longer members," 
unless that is changed v^hioh gave them a place 
in the Church, viz., the express will of God on 
this subject. It will not do to say, '' There is no 
express command in the New Testament to re- 
cognize the membership of infants by giving 
them baptism," because it will be maintained 



New Testament Passages, 83 

that there is nc need of such command, since 
baptism supplies the place of circumcision — is 
now the rite by which membership in the 
Church is recognized.* 

It is admitted that a cha7ige respecting many 
things was made in the Church when the 
"kingdom of God" was " taken from'" the Jews 
" and given to " a people " bringing forth the 
fruits thereof." But that very change was, in 
part, the inauguration of a more mild, merciful, 
and glorious dispensation. The whole Mosaic 
civil code, instituted with God's chosen people 
for governmental purposes, and designed to be in 
force only while the scepter should remain with 
Judah, and the entire ceremonial service, that 
"middle wall of partition" and "law of com- 
mandments contained in ordinances," was, when 
Shiloh came, " broken down," and he " took it 
out of the way, nailing it to the cross." Its en- 
tire machinery was " abolished " in order to give 
place to a few simple ordinances, suitable to be 
observed by '' all nations " and " every creature." 

* There is no more need of a commaitd for giving baptism 
to infants, than there would have been for giving circumcision 
to them in case the latter had been continued in the Church 
instead of baptism. And if the rite of initiation had not been 
changed, who would have thought of asking for a new com- 
mand for continuing the rite of circumcision ? 



84 Infant Baptism. 

The paschal supper gives place to the Lord's 
supper, and circumcision to baptism. But it is 
a memorable fact that in all the changes made 
in passing from the one dispensation to the 
other, requiring such *' differences of administra- 
tions " by '^ the same Lord," and in all the rec- 
ords of holy Scripture, the Divine Proprietor of 
the Church has nowhere indicated, nor in any- 
wise ifitimated, his purpose to exclude in- 
fants from membership therein; but on the 
contrary. 



Infants are of the Kingdom of Heaven, 85 



CHAPTER IV. 

ALL THE TEACHING OF CHRIST AND HIS APOS- 
TLES, TOUCHING THE RELATION OF INFANTS 
TO THE CHURCH, PLAINLY RECOGNIZES THEIR 
MEMBERSHIP. 

I. Matthew xix, 14: "But Jesus said, Suffer 
little children, and forbid them not, to come unto 
me : for of such is the kingdom of heaven." 

(a}j Let it be observed that these '' children " 
were infants proper. Anti-Pedobaptists have 
contended that, for any thing we know to the 
contrary, they were children of competent age 
to choose the service of Christ for themselves, 
and so as capable of receiving baptism as adiUt 
believers. 

But St. Luke says, (xviii, 15, 16,) ''They 
brought unto him also (/3pe0o^) infantsl' or babes. 
Jesus said, " Suffer {iraidla) little children to come 
unto me." Mark says, (x, 16,) ''He took them 
up in his arms, put his hands upon them, and 
blessed them." These facts determine the case 
that they were infants proper. 

It was shown in chap, v, in answer to objec- 



86 Infant Baptism. 

tion 5, that the anti-Pedobaptists baptize their 
candidates, not because they are believers^ but 
because, as believers, they are in a regenerate 
state; they never admit them except upon such 
a confession, actual or implied. It was shown, 
also, that infants, by virtue of the relation they 
sustain to Christ, are in the same state of grace ; 
and that infants, therefore, are entitled to bap- 
tism on the same ground as adult believei's, 

{b) " Siijfer little children^' etc. He does not 
say. Suffer thoseY\X,\\^ children to come unto me, 
as if there were something in the case of those 
I^articular children, which makes it proper for 
them to come. His words are of universal ap- 
plication, and show that all little childre7i may 
come to him, because they all bear to him the 
same 7'elatio7t, 

{c) It has been said, that " Of such is the 
kingdom of heaven," does not mean that the 
identical children themselves are of the kingdom 
of heaven, but that those adults who resemble 
little children are of the kingdom of heaven. 
And reference is made to Matthew xviii, 3, 4, 
in support of this view of the case: " Except ye 
be converted, and become as little children, ye 
shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. 
Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as 



Infajtts are of the Kmgdom of Heaven, 87 

this little child, the same is greatest in the 
kingdom of heaven." To this I reply, i. This 
view of the case scarcely admits of a fair ex- 
position of Christ's words. " Of such is the 
kingdom of heaven',' is equivalent to, The king- 
dom of heaven is composed in part *^ of stich : " 
which he would hardly have said if little chil- 
dren did not belong to his kingdom. 2. It 
would appear singularly strange if the Saviour, 
presenting in little children a model condition 
of the souls of his kingdom, should affirm that 
those who should resemble the model most 
nearly should be its inheritors, while the 
model children themselves should be excluded! 
3. Jesus assigns as the reason why the little 
children should be brought to him, that '' of 
such is the kingdom of heaven;'' but if they 
themselves were not of the kingdom of heaven, 
it could not be the reason why they should 
be brought to him. The followers of Jesus, in 
some respects, resemble sheep, (John x,) but 
that would be a ridiculous reason for bringing 
sheep to Christ ! 

{d) The phrase, " The kingdom of heaven," 
in this passage, either means the Church mili- 
tant or the Church triumphant ; the Church 
on earth or the Church on high. On the 



88 Infant Baptism. 

Saviour's lips it usually signified the fovjner; 
more rarely the lattei^ If, in the text, it be 
affirmed that infants are ''of the Church on 
high, then, surely, they are not unfit for a place 
in the Church on earth; more properly, if in- 
fants are "of" the Church on high, they are 
also '' of " the Church on earth, and are entitled 
to baptism by water, both as a symbol of their 
regenerate state, and as a sign of recognition 
of their relation to the Church, But, if Jesus 
affirmed that infants are "of" the Church on 
earth, then the controversy is at an end ; they 
should be baptized. 

2. Matthew xxviii, 19: " Go ye therefore, and 
teach (more literally, disciple or proselyte) all 
nations, baptizing them in the name of the Fa- 
ther, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." 

By the use of this language the Saviour in- 
stituted Christian baptism. Until then, all male 
Jews (the females were represented in the 
males) since the days of Abraham had entered 
the visible Church in their infancy by their 
birth, and their membership in it was recog- 
nized at eight days of age by circumcision. 
Proselytes, (strangers, coming from abroad,) 
adults, and infants, had entered it by circum- 
cision, sacrifice, and baptisjn. From that time 



Infants of Proselytes were Baptized, 89 

henceforth '' all nations " were to enter it by 
baptism in the name of the Trinity. Many of 
the Jews, converted from Judaism to Chris- 
tianity, did for many years, in connection with 
Christian baptism, apply also to their male in- 
fants the rite of circumcision. Christ, so far as 
we know, said little, if any thing, in regard to lay- 
ing it aside. Nearly twenty years after Christ's 
death (A. D. 51 or 52) Paul and Barnabas were 
sent by the Church at Antioch to counsel with 
the apostles and elders at Jerusalem (Acts xv) 
in regard to the question whether the practice 
of circumcision should be reqjiired of the Gen- 
tile eonverts, for the converted Jews had insisted 
on the Gentile Christians receiving it. And it 
v/as not until there had been long consultation, 
and ''much disputing" in the council, that they 
decided to ''trouble not" the Gentiles with the 
" burden " of circumcision. But it is quite cer- 
tain that the Jewish Christians still continued 
to practice the rite in the case of their infant 
male children for a long time afterward. 

In one sense its continued practice would, as 
Mr. Watson {Die., p. 249) remarks, " involve the 
rejection of the doctrine of justification by faith 
in Christ." For circumcision being a sign and 

seal of faith in a Messiah yet to eoine, as " the 
12 



go Infant Baptism. 

seed of Abraham," in whom all the nations 
were to be blessed, his coming, and entry upon 
the office of Mediator, would render the rite an 
obsolete ordinance, to continue which would 
seem to involve his rejection as the object of 
their faith, and would argue an expectation of a 
Messiah still yet to come. 

It w-as probably upon this ground that St. 
Paul spoke thus boldly to the Galatians, (v, 2, 3,) 
" Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be cir- 
cumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing. For 
I testify again to every man that is circumcised, 
that he is a debtor to do the whole law." Yet, 
obviously, there is another sense in which it 
might be, and evidently was, innocently, though 
not wisely, practiced. If, for the purpose merely 
''of preserving an ancient national distinction, 
upon which they valued themselves," the Jewish 
Christians continued to circumcise their chil- 
dren, they should not be harshly censured. It 
must have been with some such modified view 
of the case that Paul, to avoid coming in con- 
flict with Jewish prejudice, allowed himself to 
circumcise Timothy, (Acts xiii, 3,) whose mother 
was a Jewess. He did it '' because of the Jews 
which were in those quarters ; for they knew all 
that his father was a Greek." 



Christian yews Circumcised their htfatzts. 91 

In his epistle to the pious Hebrews, written 
A. D. 64, Paul preserves an entire silence on 
the question of circumcision. He probably 
knew that they all practiced the rite^ and he did 
not wish to encounter their prejudice or oppo- 
sition on that subject. 

Query No. i. Did those pious Hebrews, 
(members of the Christian Church,) who, for 
more than a half century after Christ, circum- 
cised their infants, regard those circumcised in- 
fants as members of the Church, as they had 
ever regarded their infant children in the old 
dispensation t If they did noty why did they 
not } And if they did thus regard them, and it 
were wrong to do so, why did not the apostles 
correct their error 1 

Query No. 2. Did the apostle " James," 
(bishop of the Jerusalem Church,) '' the breth- 
ren," and '' all the elders," regard the circum- 
cised infant children of the *^ many thousands 
of Jews which believed" (see Acts xxi, 17-21) 
as me^nbers of the Church, or did they not? If 
they did not, then why not t And if they did 
thus regard them, then ought we thus to regard 
them, and the controversy is ended. 

In the language of Christ, '' Go ye therefore 
and teach all nations, baptizijtg them " — there is 



92 Infant Baptism. 

no specification of adult or infants. The latter 
are an integral and important part of all na- 
tions. 

Query No. 3. Would the apostles, without 
the least intimation from the Saviour of any 
such purpose, exclude the infants— 2cci integral 
part of all nations — from baptism, and hence 
from the Church ? These facts are clear : — 

{a) All infants of believers were made mem- 
bers of the Church, by positive divine authority, 
at the time of its organization. 

(b) They had ever remained in the Church as 
members, until Christ directed his apostles to 
make disciples of all nations, baptizing them. 

(<:.) Christ gave no intimation of a purpose to 
exchide them. 

{d) The strong yewish prejudices of the apos- 
tles, in which they had received a life-long ed- 
ucation, were against all change in Church mat- 
ters, unless by express and specific instruction 
from the Saviour. And even when they had 
such instruction, their tenacious adherence to 
the old paths often caused them to misinterpret 
the plainest words he could utter. This fact is 
illustrated all through the New Testament his- 
tory. It prevented the disciples from compre- 
hending his teaching respecting the necessity 



Comma7id to Disciple all Nations, 93 

of his death ; the meaning of the resurrection 
of the dead ; the nature of his kingdom ; the 
divine purpose of extending the blessings of the 
Abrahamic covenant to the Gentiles. It was 
this which led to the narrowest interpretation 
(rather misinterpretatioii) of one of the most de- 
fined utterances that ever came into form by hu- 
man lips : " Go, disciple all nations, baptizing 
them." " Go ye into all the world, and preach 
the Gospel to every creaturer 

They supposed they were to "preach the Gos- 
pel to every" yewish ''creature," only, among 
" all nations," until, confronted by repeated mir- 
acle and unanswerable fact, Peter and his asso- 
ciate apostles were convinced of their error. 
See Acts x and xi. 

{e) When the apostles received the commis- 
sion to "disciple all nations, baptizing them," 
they had never seen or krtown such a thing as 
the i^tfants of believers being excluded from the 
Clmrch in all their lives. 

(/.) They had always seen the infants of per- 
sons proselyted to the Jewish religion received 
into the Church with their parents, and they were 
received by baptism. On this point, Mr. Wall, 
(the correctness of whose testimony no one will 
question,) says : "Whenever Gentiles were pros- 



94 Infant Baptism. 

elyted to the Jewish religion, they were initiated 
by circumcision, the offering of sacrifice, and 
baptism ; they were all baptized^ males and fe- 
males, adults and i7ifaiits!' 

With these significant facts in the mind, let 
us now turn to the language of invitation which 
the apostles extended to the first persons ever 
tirged to receive Christian baptism. It was soon 
after they received the commission to baptize 
*' all nations." It is recorded in the Acts of the 
Apostles, (ii, 38, 39,) as follows: ''Repent, and 
be baptized every one of you in the name of 
Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye 
shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For 
the promise is unto you, and to your childrenj and 
to all that are afar off, even as many as the 
Lord our God shall call." 

Here the apostles remind their hearers of 
'' the promise ; " that it was unto them and to 
their children, and urged them to receive bap- 
tism on the ground of such promise. Did their 
adult hearers receive baptism, while their in- 
fant children were excluded f Such a supposi- 
tion is not only out of harmony with "the 
promise," by virtue of which they were urged to 
receive baptism, but is in conflict with all the 
observation of the apostles on the subject, who 



Tlie Promise to Them and thev' Children, 95 

had always seen parents who were proselyted 
to the same Church of God in which they were 
now receiving new accessions of members, re- 
ceived with their infant child^rUy who, with 
those parents, received baptism. 

What authority had the apostles to introduce 
so marked a cha7ige in the constituent member- 
ship of the Church without the slightest intima- 
tion of the will of God on the subject ? None 
whatever. Those who can believe they did 
make stich a change are capable of believing 
without evidence. 

God had put all infants of believers into the 
Church. He had never put them out, nor inti- 
mated any purpose of having them put out ; there- 
fore they rightfully remain in the same Church. 

It may be said that " the promise " to which 
Peter referred (Acts ii, 39) was that recorded 
by Joel, (ii, 28, 29,) of the pouring out of the 
Spirit upon all flesh ; upon old men and young 
men ; sons and daughters, servants and hand- 
maids. It may be so ; but it should be remem- 
bered that the " promise of the Father " recorded 
by Joel was made in harmony with, and by vir- 
tue of, the original promise to Abraham and 
"his seed," in confirmation of which the infant 
*' seed " were required to receive the rite of ini- 



96 Infant Baptism. 

tiation into the visible Church. The promise 
by Joel is only a rehearsal of that of the cove- 
nant with the patriarch ; and Peter's refer- 
ence to it is the first thrill of its echo, sounding 
down through the Christian ages. How eupho- 
nious in its accents : " Unto thee and to thy 
seed!' '' Unto you and your children!' 

Alexander Campbell says, (Campbell and 
Rice's Debate, p. 413:) " The Jews practiced 
both circunicisio7i and baptism in their families 
during the apostolic age!' 

True ; but would Mr. Campbell have us un- 
derstand that they discriminated giving baptism 
to their adults^ and circumcision to their in- 
fants? Did they not rather baptize the same 
class that they circumcised } If they did not, 
then why not } They had always enjoyed the 
privilege of having their infant children with 
them in Church fellowship ; are they now go- 
ing to drop them without a soHtary syllable 
of instruction to that effect from the Saviour or 
his apostles 1 How unnatural such a course ; 
how preposterous is such a conclusion ! Are 
the privileges of these charter-members of the 
Church, in emerging from a typical and shadowy 
dispensation into its latter-day glory, to be ctir- 
tailed rather than enlarged ? 



The Baptisms of Households. 97 

3. Household Baptisms. 

(i.) Acts xvi,.i5. '' She was baptized, and her 
household!' Lydia, a seller of purple, of the 
city of Thyatira, hearing the apostle preach, 
was converted and baptized. We can find no 
other believer in that family, and yet ''\i^x house- 
hold was baptized!' 

(2.) Acts xvi, 33. ^^And was baptized, he and 
all his, straightway!' The jail keeper at Phil- 
ippi and his family we^e baptized immediately 
upon his conversion. Though ''all his" were 
baptized, there is no record of the faith of any 
other person but that of the jailer. 

(3.) I Corinthians i, 16. **/ baptized also the 
household of Stephanas!' Neither Paul nor 
Luke, his historian, tells how many infants 
there were in these families ; but, 

{a!) Of the nine recorded cases of Christian 
baptism by the apostles, three — a third of them — 
were household baptisms. 

(b!) There were probably as many infants in 
these three families as there would be in three 
others, selected at random in these communi- 
ties. 

{c) During the more than sixty years of the 

apostles' ministry, we have no account of the 

baptism of an adult person, who had been 
13 



98 Infant Baptism. 

brought up by Christian parents, or in a Chris- 
tian family. A fact rather remarkable, if, in the 
apostolic age, Christians did not have their in- 
fant children baptized. But it would be easily 
accounted for, and inevitable, on the hypothesis 
that their infants received the ordinance. In 
an anti-Pedobaptist community such a thing 
could never occur, where persons were con- 
verted to the Christian religion. 



Testimony of the Fathers. 99 



CHAPTER V. 

HISTORICAL TESTIMONY ; OR, THE TESTIMONY 
OF THE EARLY CHRISTIAN FATHERS. 

BEFORE introducing any evidence from 
the testimony of the Fathers of the prac- 
tice of the Church of the early ages respecting 
the baptism of infants, I desire to call the 
reader's attention to a few facts which have a 
somewhat important bearing on the subject. 

I. The ancient usage of infant baptism in the 
Church subsequent to the apostolic age would 
not, in and of itself, either obligate or authorize 
its continuance. For such authority we must 
go to the Bible. But if the teachings of Script- 
ure, though not absolutely decisive on the 
point, are nevertheless of such a character as 
to lead us to consider it obligatory, and the 
testimony of the Fathers shows that it was the 
universal and undisputed practice of the Church 
from the time of the apostles for several centu- 
ries, the proof is almost overwhelming that the 
apostles authorized the practice ; and it would 



100 Infant Baptism. 

be useless to deny, and impossible to disprove, 
its apostolic authority. These, I maintain, are 
the facts in regard to infant baptism. 

2. Not long after the apostolic age the 
Church quite generally fell into that heresy 
of the ages, baptismal ^'egefzeration, and intro- 
duced many unwarranted and strange ceremo- 
nies in connection with the administration of 
the ordinance. But these things do not in the 
least invalidate their testimony in regard to the 
fact of infant baptism as practiced among them, 
nor in regard to the universal belief of the 
Church that the practice was sanctioned by the 
apostles, and was, therefore, of divine institu- 
tion. 

3. The following facts and testimony are 
condensed from Walts '^History of Infant Bap- 
tisml' which is deservedly regarded by all par- 
ties as entirely accurate, and the most thorough 
account of infant baptism that has ever been 
given. He is said to have written with re- 
markable candor, impartiality, and ability. The 
following note, showing the estimate formed by 
competent judges of his history, is taken from 
the '' Memoirs of the Life of Dr. Wally' as cited in 
Dr. Hibbard's excellent work on '^ Infant Bap- 
tism," p. 186 : — ''On February 9, 1705, the clergy 



Wall's ''History of Infant Baptism!' lOi 

of England, assembled in general convention, 
* ordered, that the thanks of this house be given 
to Mr.. Wall, Vicar of Shoreham, in Kent, for 
the learned and excellent book he has lately 
written concerning infant baptism, and that a 
committee be appointed to acquaint him of the 
same/ Dr. Atterbury, a leading member of 
said convention, says, ' that the History of '' In- 
fant Baptism " was a book for which the author 
deserves the thanks, not of the English clergy 
alone, but of all Churches.' Mr. Whiston, also a 
very learned man, well acquainted with the writ- 
ings of the fathers of the first four centuries, 
and a professed Baptist, in his address to the 
people of that denomination, declares to them 
' that Dr. Wall's '' History of Infant Baptism," as 
to facts, appeared to him most accurately done, 
and might be depended on by the Baptists 
themselves/' The fact is, Wall's work on In- 
fant Baptism, in four octavo volmnes, is the 
crowning effort on that subject, and universally 
acknowledged as the standard, 

% I . The Testijnony of Justin Martyr. 

"We also, who by him have had access to 
God, have not received this carnal circumcision, 
but the spiritual circumcision, which Enoch, and 



102 Infant Baptism. 

those like him, observed. And we have re- 
ceived it by baptism, by the mercy of God, be- 
cause we were sinners: and it is enjoined upon 
all persons to receive it in the same way." 

Again : " Many persons among us, of sixty 
and seventy years old, of both sexes, who were 
discipled (eixaOrjTsvOeoav) to Christ in their child- 
hood, (sfi rratSajv,) do continue uncorrupted." 

Again: ''We are circumcised by baptism, 
with Christ's circumcision." 

This, first of the learned divines after the 
apostolic age, flourished A. D. 140. He wrote 
a dialogue against the Jews, which he held at 
Ephesus with Tryphon, the most distinguished 
of that people at the time, in which he main- 
tained that baptism came in the place of circiim- 
cisio7i, and upon this ground he vindicated the 
Christians in their neglect of that Jewish rite. 
The first and third of the above extracts are 
from this dialogue. The other is fi^om his cele- 
brated Apology in behalf of all Christians, and 
in defense of their religion, addressed to the 
Emperor Antoninus Pius, the Senate, and all 
the Roman people. 

I. He says to Tryphon, "We have not re^ 
ceived this carnal circumcision." Why 'i Be- 
cause we have received " the spiritual circum- 



Justin Martyr's Testimony. 103 

cision ... by baptism. . . . We are circmn- 
cised by baptism, with Christ's circumcision.'' 
Then he must regard baptism as supplying the 
place of circumcision. But circumcision was 
given, generally, only to infants ; and if baptism 
be not given to infants, it certainly could not 
come instead of that ordinance, nor in any 
proper sense supply its place ; for, in that case, 
neither circumcision nor baptism would be 
given to the infants of Gentile Christians ; and 
if they lived not to adult age, they would re- 
ceive neither the Jewish nor the Christian 
ordinance. 

2. " We have received if (spiritual circum- 
cision) "by baptism, by the mercy of God, be- 
cause we were simtersT The fathers believed 
that adults and infants were alike depraved — 
"sinners." It was a prominent point in their 
creed, also, that baptism was the prime agency, 
the Heaven-appointed means for the removal of 
all sin, original and actual. With the correct- 
ness or incorrectness of this doctrine we have 
nothing to do ; but, of the fact of their believing 
and teaching it, no one at all acquainted with 
their writings will question. No point in their 
system was more fully developed, or more uni- 
versally received. Amb7^ose says of the pagan 



I04 Infant Baptism. 

Gentile washings : ** They cannot be baptisms. 
The body is washed ; sin is not washed away!* 
Again : '' He who is baptized is . . . cleansed!' 
Gregory Nazianzen : '^ Let us be baptized ; let 
us partake of the purifying water, more purging 
than hyssop, more purifying than that of the 
law, more sanctifying than the ashes of a heifer 
sprinkling the unclean." yerome : " I will pour 
out the clean water oi saving baptism!' Origen: 
" It is only the baptism of blood which can make 
us more pu7'e than the baptism of water made 
us." Cyprian : " It is necessary that the water 
be first purified and sanctified, . . . that it may 
be able by its own baptism to wipe off the sins 
of the baptized man!' And because infants 
were as truly depraved as adults, they held that 
they needed baptism as truly. Atigtistine says : 
''The whole Church lias of old constantly held 
that baptized infants do obtain remission of 
original sill by the baptism of Christ!' Celestius : 
" We acknowledge infants ought to be baptized 
for the remission of sins, according to the rule 
of the universal Church " 

And when yiistin Martyr, only about forty 
years after the death of the Apostle John, hold- 
ing that infants and adults are alike depraved, 
says, " We have received it " (spiritual circum- 



Justin Martyr's Testimony, 105 

cision, regeneration) ^^ by baptism because we 
were sinners," he assigns as a reason for bap- 
tism^ that which requires its appHcation to in- 
faitts as truly and indispensably as to adults. 

3. Justin, by the use of the term " Christ's 
circumcision," that is, Christian circumcision, 
very aptly indicates that baptism succeeds to 
circumcision. If so, its appHcation now must 
be to the same subjects (infants) as in the for- 
mer dispensation. 

4. In his '' Apology " to the emperor : " Many 

persons among us, of sixty or severity years old, 

of both sexes, were discipled to Christ in their 

childhood," etc. He uses the same verb (fj^ad?]- 

revG), disciple) that Christ uses in Matt, xxviii, 

19, '^Go disciple (English Version, teacJt) all 

nations, baptizing them." This indicates that 

the " persons " were "jnade disciples by baptism. 

And if in Justin's time they were "sixty or 

seventy years old," they must have been thus 

made disciples when they were little children, 

(en TTacdcov,) some twenty or thirty years before 

the death of St. John, perhaps by the hands of 

some of the apostles. Let any person whose 

mind is free from prejudice calmly consider this 

fact, and ask himself whether infant baptism had 

had not the sanction of the apostles. 
14 



io6 Infant Baptism. 

§ 2. The Testimony of IrencBus. 

'' As he was a Master, he had also the age of 
a Master. Not disdaining, nor going in a way 
above, human nature, nor breaking in his own 
person the law which he had set for mankind, 
but sanctifying every several age by the like- 
ness that it has to him : for he came to save 
all persons by himself: all, I mean, who by him 
are regenerated (or baptized) unto God, in- 
fants a7id LITTLE ONES, mid children and 
youths, and elder perso7ts. Therefore, he went 
through the several ages ; for infants being 
made an infant, sanctifying infants ; to little 
ones he was made a little one, sanctifying those 
of that age, and also giving them an example 
of godliness, justice, and dutifulness." — Wall's 
Hist, of Baptis7n, vol. i, p. y2. 

The testimony of this father is exceedingly 
important, for he was in circumstances to know 
what was the practice of the early Church upon 
the subject under discussion. He was made 
bishop of the Church at Lyons, in Gaul, about 
A. D. 178; but he was born in Asia Minor, 
thirty years or less after the death of the Apos- 
tle St. John ; and being converted in his youth, 
and educated in part by Polycarp, the cele- 



IrencEiLS 's Testimony. 107 

brated bishop of Smyrna, he became a close 
and intimate friend of that apostolic father, 
who was a disciple and friend of St. John. 
Irenaeus, in his old age, speaking of Polycarp, 
says : *' I remember the things that were done 
then better than I do those of later times, so 
that I could describe the place where he sat, 
and his going out and coming in, his manner 
of life, his features, his discourse to the people 
concerning the conversation he had had with 
John, and others that had seen our Lord ; how 
he rehearsed their discourses, and what he had 
heard them that were eye-witnesses of the word 
of life say of our Lord, and of his miracles and 
doctrine : all agreeable to the Scriptures." 

Such was the close proximity of Irenaeus to 
the apostles, that his preceptor conversed freely 
with him, as with one of them. 

I. The value of the testimony of Irenaeus 
depends upon a single expression, namely, re- 
generated UNTO God. Mr. Wall asserts (and 
no authority is more reliable) that he used this 
expression to signify baptism. If so, his testi- 
mony is unmistakably in favor of infant bap- 
tism, for Christ, he says, came to save all, " who 
by him are regenerated unto Godj (or baptized,) 
infants and little oriesT 



io8 Infant Baptism. 

Dr. Hibbard says : '' The Christian fathers often 
used the word regeneration as synonymous with 
or as including baptism. ... It was a common 
mode of speaking of baptism, and we are author- 
ized, therefore, to take the testimony of Irenseus 
in the case as positive." — Infant Baptism, p. i88. 
Mr. A. Campbell says : '' In my debate with 
Mr. Walker and Mr. M'Calla, I objected to the 
substitution of the word regenerated for im- 
mersed in the extract from Iren^us and other 
of the ' primitive fathers,' as they are called, on 
the ground of their not being exactly represent- 
atives of the same idea universally. I admitted 
that sometimes they used the word regenerated 
for baptized, but not always ; and, indeed, not 
at all, in the popular sense of regenerated. Well, 
now it comes to pass, that I represent all the 
primitive fathers as using the term rege^ierated 
as equivalent to the term baptized. All this 
is true ; and what then } Why, at that time I 
used the word regenerated as expressive of a 
spiritual change, and found that those fathers 
spoke of a spiritual change as well as we. I could 
not, therefore, reconcile this to the exclusive ap- 
plication of the term regenerated to the act of 
immersion ; but 07i a more accvtrate and strict ex- 
amination of their writings, a7id of the use of this 



IraicEus's Testiuiojiy. 109 

term in the New Testament, I am assured tliat 
they used the term regenerated as equivalent to 
immersiony and spoke of the spiritual change 
under other terms and modes of speech!' — Millen-^ 
nial Harbi7iger. 

2. It is important to notice that this Father 
speaks of infant baptism, not as an innovation, a 
novelty recently introduced ; nor does he speak 
merely of his own opinion respecting it ; but as 
a practice universally understood and admitted : 
as a doctrine of the Church concerning which 
there was no dispute nor doubt. The man- 
ner of his introducing it shows that he consid- 
ered it as much a known and admitted truth 
as adult baptism — " He came to save all per- 
sons who by him are regenerated unto God : 
infants, and little children, and youth, and elder 
persons." 

3. If the practice of infant baptism was not 
apostolic, but a novelty introduced after the apos- 
tles' days, it must have been introduced during 
the time of either Irenaeus or of Polycarp, the lat- 
ter of whom was for nearly twenty years contem- 
porary with the Apostle John. But it is abso- 
lutely INCREDIBLE that such an innovation could 
have obtained so universally, without such op- 
position as would have made its record upon 



no Infant Baptism. 

the pages of history. Especially would Irenaeus 
himself have spoken of it, who wrote " a great 
work in five books against the heresies ; a con- 
futation of all the Gnostics^ and a defense of 
the Catholic faith against most of the heretics 
of that age." " The book," says Dr. Murdock, 
"contains much information respecting the 
early heretics, their opinions, sentiments, and 
characters ; also respecting the state of theolog- 
ical science in that age, the doctrines generally 
received and taught, and the manner of stating 
and defending them." — Murdock' s Mosheim^ 
Cen, II, Part II, chap, ii, n. 5. 

There is certainly, no ground for believing 
that infant baptis^fiy to which Irenaeus makes 
reference in the phrase, " Regenerated unto 
God," was a post-apostolic irmovatioit. And Dr. 
Rice well remarks : " The indirect, yet clear 
testimony of Irenaeus, so near to the Apostle 
John, goes very far indeed to prove, not only 
that it was generally practiced, but that it 
was of divine authority." — Debate with Camp- 
bell^ p. 389. 

§ 3. The Testimony of Tertullian, 

This first of the Latin Fathers was born A.D. 
160. He was contemporary, therefore, for more 



Tertidlian 's Testimony. in 

than forty years, with Irenseus ; was made pres- 
byter of Carthage in Africa, A. D. 192 ; and 
flourished, as a writer, about the close of the 
second century. " He was a man," says Jerome, 
'' of eager and violent temper." He was also of 
irregular principles and habits and morose dis- 
position ; and was subject to great inconsist- 
ency, as is illustrated by the fact that after writ- 
ing ^' A Conf7Uation of all Heresies',' he, in after 
life, embraced and zealously defended Monta- 
nism, the wildest of them all. 

'' Which were the greatest," says Dr. Mosheim, 
" his excellences or his defects, it is difficult to 
say. He possessed great genius ; but he was 
wild and unchastened. His piety was active 
and fervent, but likewise gloomy and austere. 
He had much learning and knowledge, but 
lacked discretion and judgment ; he was more 
acute than solid." He had imbibed the notioA 
(prevalent at that time) that baptism swept 
away all sin, both original and practical ; and 
held that sin committed after baptism was es~ 
pecially dangerous^ as there was no other means 
for its removal. 

I write these things that the reader may 
the better understand and appreciate his testi- 
mony. 



112 Infant Baptism. 

He says : " But they whose duty it is to ad- 
minister baptism, are to know that it is not to 
be given rashly. ' Give to every one that ask- 
eth thee/ has its proper subject, and relates to 
almsgiving ; but that command rather is here to 
be considered, * Give not that which is holy unto 
the dogs, neither cast your pearls before swine :' 
and that (command,) ' Lay hands suddenly on no 
man, neither be partakers of other men's faults.' 
. . . Therefore, according to every one's condi- 
tion and disposition, and also their age, t/ie 
DELAYING of baptism is more p7'ofitable^ especially 
in the case ^little children. For what need 
is there that the godfathers should be brought 
into danger.? because they, may either fail of 
their promises by death, or they may be mis- 
taken by a child's proving of a wicked dispo- 
sition. Our Lord says, indeed, ' Do not forbid 
them to come to me.' Therefore, let them 
come when they are grown up ; let them come 
when they understand ; when they are instruct- 
ed whither it is they come ; let them be made 
Christians when they know Christ. What need 
their guiltless age make such haste to the for- 
giveness of sin } Men will proceed more wa- 
rily in worldly things ; and he that should not 
have earthly goods committed to him, yet shall 



Tertulliaii 's Testimony. 113 

he have heavenly ? Let them know how to de- 
sire the salvation, that you may appear to have 
given to one that asketh. '* For no less reason, 
tmmarried persons ought to be kept off, who are 
hkely to come into temptation, as well as those 
that were never married, upon the account of 
their coming to ripeness, as those in wisdom- 
hood, for the miss of their partner : until they 
either marry or be confirmed in continence. 
They that understand the weight of baptism 
will rather dread the receiving it than the delay- 
ing of it." — Wall^ vol. i, pp. 93, 94. 

I. Anti-Pedobaptists have brought all their 
batteries to bear against the testimony of Ter- 
tullian. They tell us, i. That we have no 
proof to the contrary, that the children men- 
tioned by him were grown to years of tinder- 
standing. Mr. Campbell says, (" Debate with 
Rice," p. 422,) " No man can tell whether he 
meant babes or boys." 

As though the Father had not said, ''Little 

children'' As though he had not spoken of 

''godfathers,'' a class of officials used at the 

baptism of none but infants. As though he had 

not written, " Let them come zvheji they are 

grown up, when they come to 2uidersiand, when 

they knoiv Chist',' As though he had said 
15 



114 Infant Baptism. 

nothing about *' their guiltless age!' O, shame 
on such recklessness of assertion ! It is very 
cheap in some quarters ; but it gives as little 
credit for the intelUgence of its readers as for 
the probity of its author. 2. They tell us that 
'' Tertttllian''' ''opposed infant baptis7n;'' as if 
he had hinted even that it was imscriptural, or 
without apostolic sanctioii ; and as if, forsooth, 
they had not already argued that they were not 
infants proper of which he was speaking, but 
grown " boysT Mr. Campbell says, ('' Debate 
with Rice," p. 422,) *' Te7'tiillian opposed if 
(infant baptism) . , . '' as I affirin!' 

2. If, as anti-Pedobaptists affirm, Tertullian 
^'opposed'' infant baptism, that fact is the best 
proof possible that it was prevalent at the time; 
and he speaks of it as a well-known and general 
practice, as much so as that of ''unmarried per- 
sons," " those that were never married," and 
"those in widowhood." But he advises ''the 
delaying of it!' Such reference to the practice 
proves it to have been instituted long before. 

3. He did not oppose infant baptism as such ; 
as a practice that was wj^ong in itself : had he 
done so, he would, as every one must know, have 
declared it unscriptural ; as not having apostolic 
sanction : as an innovation, or as contrary to the 



Tertiillian 's Testirnony. 1 1 5 

faith and practice of the Church. But he makes 
no such plea in support of his novel opinion^ 
never before met with in the history of the 
Church, that '' the delaying of baptism is more 
profitable y especially in the case of little chil- 
dren!' He does endeavor to defend his pecul- 
iar position with arguments ; what are they ? 

'' The godfathers " will be '' brought into dan- 
ger, because they may fail of their promises by 
death,*' or the children may prove " of a wick- 
ed disposition." '^They that understand the 
weight of baptism will rather dread the receiv- 
ing it than the delaying of it." Here is a hi^it 
at the real reason for proposing to '' delay " the 
ordinance. '^ The weight of baptism, and the 
dread of receiving it," come from the false and 
superstitious notions, j?ri-/, that baptism washes 
azvay all sins ; ^nd second, th^t sins committed 
after baptism are especially to be '' dreaded " 
for want of means for their removal, since bap- 
tism must not be repeated. For the same rea- 
son he advises the delay of the baptism of " un- 
married persons." Mark what he says : '^ For 
NO LESS REASON," (than for the delaying of i^i- 
fant baptism,) " tinmarried persons ought to be 
kept off!' Here he affirms that there is as much 
REASON for delaying the baptism of " nmnarried 



ii6 Infant Baptism. 

persons,'' as there is for delaying the baptism of 
infants : but this could not be affirmed, unless 
the baptism of infants was believed to rest upon 
the same divine authority. Therefore, Tertid- 
Han represents that the baptis^n of infants is of 

DIVINE AUTHORITY. 

4. The universal belief of the doctrine and 
prevalence of the practice of infant baptism, 
without the slightest breath of opposition in 
the Church, spread over most of Europe, East- 
ern Asia, and Northern and Eastern Africa, 
within a hundred years after the death of St. 
John, is a remarkable fact, which cannot be ex- 
plained except upon the hypothesis of its divine 
instit2ttio7i. Unless it descended from the apos- 
tles with their sanction, it was an innovation 
by authority merely human. If so, when and 
by whom was it introduced } Both Irenaeus 
and Tertullian, as we have seen, wrote an ac- 
count of the rise and progress of probably every 
heresy known to the Church, and of every 
innovation which had ever been made ; but 
neither they nor any other writer, so far as is 
known, for more than a thousand years after 
Christ, ever so much as hinted that infant bap- 
tism was an innovation, was not of God. 

Between the time of the Father last named, 



Tertullian 's Testimony. 1 1 7 

and the next, whose testimony it is proposed to 
notice, about A. D. 222, flourished Hippolytits, 
whom the learned Pressense characterizes as 
the '* Origen of the West," and says that his 
great work entitled Philosophoiimeita " is a vast 
repertory, reviewing all the doctrinal contro- 
versies of the Church from the earliest ages 
and most obscure beginnings of Gnosticism. 
Christian antiquity has left us no more valuable 
monument than the treatise ' On all the Here- 
sies,' discovered a few years since among the 
dusty treasures of a convent of Mount Athos." — 
Withrow on the Catacombs of Rome, p. 393, note. 
And yet, in all the writings of one so com- 
petent to the task, and living within one hun- 
dred and twenty-five years of the apostolic age, 
professedly commenting upon '' all the heresies'' 
and '^ all the doctrinal controversies of the Chnrch 
from the earliest ages and most obscure begin- 
nings of error ; not one syllable is said of in- 
fant baptism as a heresy, or innovation, or as 
producing a controversy in the Church ! The 
legitimate and inevitable conclusion from these 
facts must be, that infant baptism was never a 
subject of controversy in the early ages, and was, 
therefore, of divine authority. 



ii8 Infant Baptism. 

§ 4. The Testhnony of Origen, 

Origen was born A. D. 185, in Egypt. His 
father was a martyr when the son was seven- 
teen years old. He descended from a Christian 
ancestry, his grandfather and great-grandfather 
also having been Christians. He traveled ex- 
tensively, and resided at several of the great 
church centers — Rome, Palestine, and Alexan- 
dria. He was the most learned of, and occupied 
the first rank among, the early fathers. In phi- 
losophy and general knowledge, and especially 
in the knowledge of sacred literature, he was 
deservedly the most celebrated man in the early 
Christian ages. Dr. Priestley says, *' He was a 
man so remarkable for his piety, genius, and 
application, that he must be considered an 
honor to Christianity and to human nature." 
Dr. Mosheim calls him "a man truly great, and 
a luminary to the Christian world," and adds, 
'* all should revere his virtues and his merits." 

In one of his homilies on Leviticus he speaks 
as follows : '^ Hear David speaking : ^ I was', says 
he, ' conceived in iniquity, and in sin did my moth- 
er ' bring me forth : showing that every soul that 
is born in the flesh is polluted with the filth of 
sin and iniquity ; and that, therefore, that was 



Origen 's Testimony, 1 1 9 

said which we mentioned before, that none is 
clear from polhction, thongh his life be but the 
length of 07ie day. Besides all this, let it be con- 
sidered what is the reason that whereas the bap- 
tism of the Church is given for the forgiveness of 

sins, INFANTS ALSO ARE, BY THE USAGE OF THE 

Church, baptized ; when, if there were nothing 
in infants that wanted forgiveness and mercy, 
the grace of baptism, would be needless to them." 

Again, in a homily on Luke : '^ Having occa- 
sion given in this place, I will m.ention a thing 
that causes frequent inquiries among the breth- 
ren. Infants are baptized for the forgiveness of 
silts. Of what sins 1 or when have they sinned } 
or how can any reason of the law in their case 
hold good, but according to that sense we men- 
tioned even now — none are free from pollution, 
though his Hfe be but of the length of one day 
upon the earth 1 And it is for that reason, 
becatise by the sacrament of baptism the pollution 
of our birth is taken away, that infants are 
baptized!' 

Again, in his Commentary on Romans, he 
says : '' For this, also, it was, that the Church 
had from the apostles a tradition (or order) to 
give baptism even to infants. For they to whom 
the divine mysteries were committed knew that 



I20 Infant Baptism. 

there is in all persons the natural pollution of 
sin, which must be done away by water and 
the Spirit ; by reason of which the body itself 
is called the body of sin." — Wall, vol. i, pp. 
104-106. 

What, now, is the value of the testimony of 
Origen in deciding the question under discus- 
sion.^ I feel free to say, that were all the other 
patristic writers entirely silent on the subject, 
and were there not a hint in all the records of 
uninspired history, /r^? or con, touching the sub- 
ject, his testimony alone would warrant the 
ready conclusion and firm belief that infant 
baptism was the nniversal practice of the Church 
from the apostolic age. What are the facts in 
the case } 

1. He was a man of tindotibted veracity, as 
we are assured by contemporary and subsequent 
writers. ''As his doctrine, so was his life ; and 
as his Ife, so was his doctrine," was an adage 
that many loved to rehearse in regard to him. 
See Eitsebiics, Book VI, chap. iii. 

2. He had the very best chance of knowing 
what he affirmed. None among the ancient 
Fathers were more completely informed on all 
matters respecting the Church ; whether in re- 
lation either to its history or its theology ; its 



Origen 's Testimony. 1 2 1 

belief or its practice ; concerning the present 
or the past. He was born only eighty-five 
years after the death of the last of the apos- 
tles. Some of his ancestors ('* grandfathers and 
great-grandfathers/' Rufinus calls them) were 
contemporary with, and probably acquainted 
and conversed with, some of the apostles. He 
enjoyed the most direct aiid reliable tradition 
from the aj[)ostles through his own Christian 

ANCESTRY. 

'' The doctrine of Origen, and his Christian 
instruction, he derived from his ancestors." So 
says Ettsebius. (Book vi, chap, xix.) The 
contiguity, therefore, of this Father, to the 
apostles, afforded him, to say the least, a good 
opportunity of knowing from uncorrupted tradi- 
tion, as well as by other means, many things 
which the apostles did and taught. 

3. The writings containing his testimony have 

come down to us without the least well-founded 

suspicion of any ijiterpolation or alteration by 

which that testimony might be invalidated. It 

is, therefore, as reliable as any thing, received 

through translation, in the histories of the 

past ages. I am not unaware that Dr. Gale, an 

Enghsh Baptist of the last century, has opposed 

the admission of Origen's testimony, on the 
18 



122 Infant Baptism. 

ground of its coming through what he regards 
a faulty translation by Rufinus. But the en- 
deavor of Dr. Gale to weaken the force of Ori- 
gen's testimony, only illustrates the remark 
made above, that opposers of infant baptism 
had brought all their batteries to bear against 
the invincible fortress of truth presented by the 
Fathers on this subject. Dr. Wall has fully 
exposed the groundlessness of the exceptions 
taken by Dr. Gale to the admission of Ori- 
gen's testimony, and has shown his unfairness 
in the attempt. Besides, the Homily on St. 
Luke, from which I have quoted, was trans- 
lated by Jerome, ''whose translation is allowed 
to be a faithful one." 

4. His statements are clear ; involved in no 
obscurity, ambiguity, technicality, or uncer- 
tainty. He says : "• Infants are, by the usage 
OF THE Church, baptized." 

Again: ^'Infants are baptized for the forgive- 
ness of sins. . . . A7id it is for that reason, 
because by the sac7Xi7nent of baptism the polhttion 
of our birth is taken away, that infants are 

BAPTIZED." 

Again : For this also it was, that the Church 
HAD from the apostles a tradition (or order) 
to give baptism even to infants." 



Origen's Testimony. 123 

5. It remains to be observed that in all his 
discourses he speaks of the baptism of infants, 
not of set purpose, but only incidentally, on ac- 
count of its connection (in the plan of redemp- 
tion) with original or birth sin. " The pollu- 
tion of our birth." As to this father's theology, 
that baptism washes away sin, original or prac- 
tical, we have no controvers.y ; it was the error 
of the times, and was universal. But his state- 
ment of the fact, that tlie Chtcrehy without a dis- 
senting voice, regarded infant baptism as truly 
of divine authority as adtilt baptism, is as un- 
mistakable as the truth of the doctrine is unan- 
swerable. 

§ 5. The Testimony of Cyprian. 

This learned prelate was made Bishop of 
Carthage, in Africa, A. D. 250, which position 
he held until he fell a martyr to Christianity, 
A. D. 258. He was noted for amiableness and 
spotlessness of character, and for piety and hu- 
mility as well. Three years after his elevation 
to the bishopric he sat as president of a coun- 
cil of sixty-six bishops, in the city of Carthage, 
convened to consult upon matters relating to 
the doctrines and discipline of the Church, 
which council gave a most unanimous and out- 
spoken testimony in regard to the universal 



124 Infant Baptism. 

prevalence of infant baptism. One Fidus, a 
country bishop, not being present, sent a letter 
of inquiry as to whether, in case of necessity, 
an infant might be baptized before the eighth day 
after its birth; expressing an opinion that it 
ought not. The bishop presiding, and the 
council, replied to his letter as follows : " Cyp- 
rian, and the rest of the bishops who are pres- 
ent at the council, in number sixty-six, to Fidus, 
our brother, greeting : We read your letter, 
most esteemed brother, in which you write of 
one Victor, a priest, etc. . . . But to the 
case of infants : Whereas, you judge ' that they 
must not be baptized within two or three days 
after they are born, and that the rule of circum- 
cision is to be observed, so that none shall be 
baptized and sanctified before the eighth day 
after he is born : * We were all, in our as- 
sembly, OF A CONTRARY OPINION. For as for 
what you thought fitting to be done, there 
was not one that was of your mind, but all 
of us, on the contrary, judged that the grace 
and mercy of God is to be denied to no per- 
son that is born. For, whereas our Lord, in 
his Gospel, says, * The Son of man came not 
to destroy men's souls (or lives) but to save 
them ; ' as far as lies in us, no soul, if possible, 



Cyprian s Testimony, 125 

is to be lost. ... So that we judge that 
no person is to be hindered from obtaining 
grace by the law that is now appointed ; and 
that the spiritual circumcision (that is, the 
grace of baptisin) ought not to be impeded by 
the circumcision that was according to the 
flesh, (that is, Jewish circumcision,) but that 
all are to be admitted to the grace of Christ ; 
since Peter, speaking in the Acts of the 
Apostles, says, 'The Lord has shown me 
that no person is to be called common or 
unclean.' 

" If any thing could be an obstacle to persons 
against their obtaining the grace, the adults, 
and grown, and aged, would be rather hindered 
by their more grievous sins. If, then, the great- 
est offenders, and those that have grievously 
sinned against God before, have, when they 
afterward come to believe, forgiveness of their 
sins, and no person is prohibited from baptism 
and grace ; how much less reason is there to 
refuse an infant, who, being newly born, has no 
sin, save that he descended from Adam accord- 
ing to the flesh, he has from his very birth con- 
tracted the contagion of the death anciently 
threatened ; who comes for this reason more 
easily to receive forgiveness of sins, because they 



126 Infant Baptism. 

are not his own, hut others' sins that are for- 
given him. 

*'This, therefore, most esteemed brother, 
was our opinion in the assembly, that it is not 
for us to hinder any person from baptism and 
the grace of God, who is merciful and kind, and 
affectionate to all. Which rule, as it is to 
govern universally, so we think it more especial- 
ly to be observed in reference to infants and 
persons newly born. To whom our help and 
the divine mercy is rather to be granted, 
because by their weeping and wailing at their 
first entrance into the world, they do intimate 
nothing so much as that they implore compas- 
sion. Dearest brother, we wish you always 
good health." — Cyprians Epistle to Fidus, as 
quoted by Hibbard^ p. 197. 

This is a very sensible epistle, full of the 
sweet spirit of the Master, and (if we except 
the fancied and false element in the premises — 
baptismal regeneration) its logic is faultless. 

I. The statement that "no person is to be 
hindered from obtaining the grace, by the law" 
(of baptism) " that is, now " (in the new dispensa- 
tion) " appointed : and that the spiritual circum- 
cision " (baptism) " ought not to be impeded by 
the circumcision that was according to the 



Cyprian's Testimony. 127 

flesh ; '' shows conclusively the opinion of these 
sixty-seven bishops, that baptism superseded 
circumcision, and for this reason, as well as 
others, should be given to the same class of 
subjects. 

2. The inquiry of Fidus was not whether 
infants should be baptized ; that was 710 1 a ques- 
tion : but whether '' the rule of circumcision was 
not to be observed, so that none should be 
baptized before the eighth day after he is born!' 

3. The unanimous decision of the council 
that baptism is to be '^ de7tied to no person that 
is BORN," demonstrates undeniably the universal 
practice of baptizing infants ; especially as the 
orthodoxy of their decision was never called 
in question, so far as history shows, by any 
man or set of men. Catholic or heretic. The 
dioceses of these bishops must have spread 
over a good portion of the territory occupied 
by the African Church ; and their occupants 
were certainly in condition to know what was 
the sentiment and practice of the Church uni- 
versal respecting infant baptism, not only, but, 
''it is quite clear," says Dr. Hibbard, "they 
were amply competent to decide whether that 
practice was according to the apostles* doctrine 
and usage.'* 



128 Infant Baptism. 

Cyprian, born about A.D. 200, (according to 
Hale and Wheeler,) was fifty-three years of age 
when called to preside in this council of bishops. 
In that assembly were men probably from ten 
to twenty years, at least, older than himself. If 
so, they were born within eighty or ninety years 
of the apostolic age. Some of their grand- 
fathers, and nearly all of their great-grand- 
fathers, were living at the time of the apostles, 
and had personal knowledge of the doctrines 
and usage of the primitive Churches. 

The members of that Carthaginian council 
were all men of extensive information in Church 
matters, and thoroughly posted in the histo- 
ry of its doctrines and usages. They were 
thoroughly conversant, also, with the current 
apostolic tradition, gushing fresh and pure from 
its fountain head. In view of these pregnmit 
facts ^ it is believed they could not have been ig- 
norant of the practice and teaching of the apos- 
tles touching a subject of interest so absorbing 
and universal as was that of infant baptism. In 
Milner's " Church History," (Cen. iii, chap, xiii, 
as cited by Hibbard,) we have the following 
upon this first council of Carthage : " Here is an 
assembly of sixty-six pastors, men of approved 
fidelity and gravity, who have stood the fiery 



Cyprian 's Testimo7iy. 1 29 

trial of some of the severest persecutions ever 
known, and who have tested their love to the 
Lord Jesus Christ in a more striking manner 
than any anti-Pedobaptists have had an oppor- 
tunity of doing in our days ; and if we may judge 
of their religious views by those of Cyprian — 
and they w^ere all in perpetual harmony vv^ith him 
— they were not wanting in any fundamental of 
godliness. No man in any age more reverenced 
the Scriptures, and made more copious use of 
them on all occasions, than he did ; and, it 
must be confessed, in the very best manner. 
For he uses them continually for practice, not 
for OSTENTATION ; for USE, not for victory in 
argument. Before this holy assembly a ques- 
tion is brought — not whether infants should be 
baptized at all, none contradicted this — but 
whether it is right to baptize them immediately, 
or on the eighth day } Without a single nega- 
tive, they all determine to baptize them immedi- 
ately. This transaction passed in the year A. D. 
253. Let the reader consider : If infant bap- 
tism had been an innovation, it must have been 
one of a considerable standing. The disputes 
concerning Easter, and other very uninterest- 
ing points, show that such an innovation must 

have formed a remarkable era in the Church. 
17 



130 Infant Baptism. 

" The number of heresies and divisions had 
been very great. Among them all, such a de- 
viation from apostolic practice as this must 
have been remarked. To me it appears impos- 
sible to account for this state of things but on 
the footing that it had ever been allowed, and 
therefore that it was the custom of the first 
Church." 

§ 6. The Testimony of Gregory Nazianzen, 

This Father was son of a bishop of the same 
name, and was born in the province of Cappa- 
docia, in Asia Minor, about A. D. 320. He was 
one of the most learned men of the age in 
which he lived. Having commenced his studies 
at Cesarea in Cappadocia, he continued them 
at Cesarea in Palestine, and at Alexandria, and 
completed his preparatory course at Athens, 
after a term of five years in the last named 
place. Here he was fellow-student, of equal 
prominence and promise, with Basil the Great, 
the intimacy of whose friendship he enjoyed 
ever after ; and with Julian the Apostate, upon 
whom, at the time of his death, he composed 
two invectives. 

Gregory was made successively bishop of 
Sasima, Nazianzus, and Constantinople ; and, 



Gregory Nazianzen 's Testimony. 131 

on account of his unrivaled eloquence and great 
popularity, the General Council of Constantino- 
ple and the Emperor Theodosius constrained him 
to accept the patriarchal chair of that metrop- 
olis. But his preference for retired life caused 
him to seek seclusion, in which he engaged him- 
self in the composition of Christian literature 
to the end of his days. 

His testimony in favor of infant baptism is 
ample and clear, but our limits will allow of 
only a small portion of it. In common with the 
men of his time he imbibed thoroughly the 
superstition — more or less prevalent in portions 
of the Church in all ages — that baptism cleanses 
from all sins, original and practical. But he 
was alarmed at the inevitable outgrowth of so 
fundamental an error, namely, the increasing 
practice of delaying baptism from year to year. 
It was becoming quite common for persons to 
remain in the state of catechumens (a sort of 
probation, in which baptism was not given) 
until just before death, and then receive bap- 
tism and be admitted into the Church. 

''The practice," says Dr. Hibbard, "which 
had now received the example of the Emperor 
Constantine, had . . . grown out of a supersti- 
tious notion of the saving efficacy of baptism. 



132 Infant Baptism. 

They considered that it removed all previous 
guilt ; and, as the ordinance could not be re- 
peated, and as they feared they might stain the 
purity of their baptism afterward if they bap- 
tized in early life, they were easily betrayed into 
the habit of deferring it. This exact view it 
is important to remember, and against it Gregory 
levels the artillery of his argument and the pol- 
ished shafts of his eloquence. He reminds 
them of the danger of losing baptism by sud- 
den death ; that such procrastination is often a 
mere pretext for living longer in carnal pleas- 
ures ; that it is a wily stratagem of the devil to 
cheat souls, which he calls upon them to resist." 
In a set discourse on baptism, this Greek 
Father says, "Art thou a youth .^ fight against 
pleasures and passions with this auxiliary 
strength : list thyself in God's army. Art 
thou old ? let thy gray hairs hasten thee. 
Strengthen thy age with baptism. . . . Hast 
thou an infant child ? let no wickedness have 
the advantage of time ; let him be sanctified 
from his infancy. Let him be dedicated from 
his cradle in the Spirit. Thou, as a faint- 
hearted mother, and of little faith, art afraid of 
giving him the seal, (that is, baptism,) because 
of the weakness of nature. Hannah, before 



Gregory Nazianze7i's Testimony, 133 

Samuel was born, consecrated him, and brought 
him up from the first in a priestly garment, not 
fearing on account of human infirmities, but 
trusting in God. Thou hast no need of am.u- 
lets or charms. . . . Give to him the Trinity, 
that great and excellent preservative." 

Again : " Some of them (those who neglect 
baptism) live like beasts, and regard not bap- 
tism. Some have a value for baptism, but de- 
lay the receiving it, either out of negligence, or 
a greediness longer to enjoy their lusts. But 
some others have it not in their own power to 
receive it, either because of their infancy, per- 
haps, or by reason of some accident utterly in- 
voluntary. . . . And I think of the first sort, 
(that is, those who despise baptism,) that they 
shall be punished, as for their other wickedness 
so for their slighting of baptism. And that the 
second shall be punished, but in a less degree, 
because they are guilty of their own missing it, 
but rather through folly than malice. But that 
the last sort, (those who omit baptism involun- 
tarily, as infants,) will neither be glorified nor 
punished by the last judge ; as being without 
the seal, (that is, baptism,) but not through their 
own wickedness ; and as having suffered the loss 
rather than occasioned it. 



134 Infant Baptism. 

" We must, therefore, make it our utmost care 
that we do not miss the common grace," etc. 
*' Some may say, suppose this to hold in the case 
of those who can desire baptism : what say you 
to those that are as yet infants, and are not in 
capacity to be sensible, either of the grace or 
the want of it ? Shall w^e baptize them, too ? 
Yes, by all means, if any danger make it req- 
uisite. For it is better that they be sanctified 
without their own sense of it, than that they 
should be unsealed and uninitiated. And our 
7'easo7i for this is ci^xtimcisiony which was per- 
formed on the eighth day, and was a typical seal, 
and was practiced on those who had no use of 
reason. 

"As for others, I give my opinion that they 
should stay three years, or thereabouts, when 
they are able to hear and answer some of the 
holy words ; and though they do not perfectly 
understand them, yet they form them : and that 
you then sanctify thein i7i soul arid body with the 
great sacrament of consecration. 

" For though they are not liable to give ac- 
count of their life before their reason be come 
to maturity, yet by reason of those sudden and 
unexpected assaults of dangers that are by no 
means to be prevented, it is by all means advisa- 



Gregory Nazianzen's Testhnony, 135 

ble that they be secured by the laver of bap- 
tism." 

A few brief remarks upon these lengthy quo- 
tations will suffice. I. The unvaried and un- 
disputed belief of the age in which Gregory 
lived, that baptism was the divinely appoiitted 
and sole agency by which the guilt and stains 
of sin could be removed, was indeed a grave 
error, and doubtless had its effect to impair the 
purity, vitality, and the efficiency of the Church : 
but that fact does not in the least invalidate 
their testimony that infant baptism was held by 
all to rest upon the authority of inspiration, and 
to have received the sanction of the apostles. 

2. The fact of the tendency of the times to 
defer infant baptism did not in the least imply 
want of faith in its divine authority, for there was 
the same tendency to defer adult baptism ; and, 
as already explained, for the same reason. It 
did not argue, therefore, against infant baptism, 
as suck, any more than against adult baptism. 
Gregory, who gives it as his opinion that " they 
should stay three years, or thereabouts, when they 
are able to hear and answer some of the holy 
words, though they do not perfectly understand 
them," urges their immediate baptism, *' by all 
means, if any danger make it requisite." 



136 IxFANT Baptism. 

3. Tertullian and Gregory Nazianzen were 
the only persons for more than a thousand years 
after Christ that mentioned the delay of infant 
baptism at all ; the former till the age of reason, 
and, in case of adults, till relieved from exposure 
to special temptation ; and the latter, as above 
stated, till about three years. But Tertullian, 
as well as Gregory, would give baptism hnmedi- 
ately where there was danger of death, as is set 
forth in his speeches. 

As it is the purpose to give only a specimen 
of the testimony of the early Fathers on the 
subject of this chapter, I shall be compelled to 
pass unnoticed that of Clement, presbyter of the 
Church and president of the Divinity School 
at Alexandria ; of Basil the Great, bishop of 
Cesarea, in Cappadocia ; of Optatiis, bishop of 
Melevi, in Numidia ; of Ambrose, bishop of Mi- 
lan ; of Ckrysostom, bishop of Constantinople, 
and of others who have spoken out distinctly 
upon the subject, and come down to those of 
later years. 

§ 7. The Testimony of Augtcstme. 

The fame of Augustine^ or St, Austin, as he 
is called, has spread throughout the world. He 
possessed a superior genius, a constant love of 



Augustine's Testimony. 137 

truth, patience in its pursuit, and undoubted 
piety. He debated with, and wrote much 
against, different classes of heretics, and wrote 
a history of all the heresies. He exerted a 
great and extensive influence in the Church, 
and did much to shape the theological views of 
his time. In a treatise of his against the 
Donatists, we have the following : '' So that 
m^any persons, increasing in knowledge after 
their baptism, and especially those ivho have been 
baptized either when they were infants, or when 
they were youths, as their understanding is 
cleared and enlightened, and their ' inward man 
renewed day by day,' do themselves deride, and 
with abhorrence and confession abjure, the for- 
mer opinions which they had of God, when they 
v/ere imposed on by their own imaginations. 
And yet they are not therefore accounted either 
not to have received baptism^ or to have a baptism 
of the same nature of their error. But in their 
case, both the validity of the sacrament is ac- 
knowledged, and the vanity of their own under- 
standing rectified." 

Again : '' And as the thief, who by necessity 
went without baptism, was saved ; because by 
his piety he had it spiritually : so, where baptism 

is had, though the party by necessity go with- 
18 



138 Infant Baptism. 

out that (faith) which the thief had, yet he is 
saved : which, being handed dozvn to them, the 
universal Church holds, with 7'espect to infants who 
ai^e baptized: who certainly cannot yet beUeve 
with a heart to righteousness, or confess with 
the mouth to salvation, as the thief could ; nay, 
by their crying and noise, while the sacrament 
is being administered, they disturb the holy 
mysteries ; and yet no Christian will say they 
are baptized to no purpose. 

'^ And if any one do ask for divine aitthoidty 
in this matter, though that which the universal 
Church practices, which has not been instituted by 
councils, but has always been observed, is most 
justly believed to be nothing else than a tiling de- 
livered {or handed down) by the authority of the 
apostles : yet we may, besides, take a true esti- 
mate, how much the sacrament of baptism does 
avail infants by the circumcision which God's 
former people received. 

" Therefore, as in Abraham the righteousness 
of faith went before, and circumcision, the seal of 
righteousness of faith, came after ; so in Corne- 
lius, (the centurion,) the spiritual sanctification 
by the gift of the Holy Spirit went before, and 
the sacrament of regeneration by the laver of 
baptism came after And as in Isaac, who was 



Augustine's Testimony, 139 

circumcised the eighth day, the seal of the right- 
eousness of faith went before, and (as he was 
follower of his father's faith) the righteousness 
itself, the seal whereof had gone before in his 
infancy, came after ; so in infants baptized, the 
sacrament of regeneration goes before, and (if 
they put in practice the Christian religion) con- 
version of the heart, the mystery whereof went 
before in their body, comes after. And as in 
the thief s case, (alluding to the thief upon the 
cross with our Saviour,) what was wanting of 
the sacrament of baptism the mercy of the 
Almighty made up, bej:ause it was not out of 
pride or contempt, but of necessity, that it was 
wanting ; so in infants that die after they are 
baptized, it is to be believed that the same 
grace of the Almighty does make up that defect 
that, by reason not of av/icked will, but of want 
of age, they can neither beheve with the heart 
to righteousness, nor confess with the mouth 
unto salvation. So that when others answer 
for them, that they may have this sacrament 
given them, it is valid for their consecration, 
because they cannot answer for themselves. 
But if for one that is able to answer for him- 
self, another should answer, it would not be 
valid. 



140 Infant Baptism. 

^' By all which it appears that the sacrament 
of baptism is one thing, and conversion of the 
heart another ; but that the salvation of a per- 
son is completed by both of them. And if one 
of these be wanting, we are not to think that it 
follows that the other is wanting ; since one 
may be without the other in an infant, and the 
other without that in the thief: God Almighty 
making up, both in one and the other case, that 
which was not willfully wanting. But when 
either of these is willfully wanting, it involves 
the individual in guilt." 

Again, in his comment on Genesis : '' Yet the 
citstom of oin' mother, the Churchy in baptiz- 
ing infants, is by no means to be disregarded, 
nor be accounted needless, nor believed to be other 
than a tradition of the apostles!' * 

In reply to a letter of eighteen Pelagian bish- 
ops addressed to Augustine, he says : " But 
this I say, that the original sin is so plain by 
the Scriptures, and that it is forgiven to infants 
in the laver of regeneration is so confirmed by 
the ANTIQUITY and authority of the Catholic 
faith, so NOTORIOUS by the practice of the 
Church, that whatsoever is disputed, inquired, 
or affirmed of the origin of the soul, if it be 
contrary to this, cannot be true." 



Augustine's Testimony, 141 

In some of his books treating on original sin, 
he says : '^ The whole Church has of old con- 
stantly held that baptized infants do obtain re- 
mission of original sin, by the baptism of Christ. 
For my part, I do not remember that I ever 
heard any other thing from any Christians that 
received the Old and New Testaments, neither 
from such as were in the Catholic Churchy nor 
yet from such as belonged to any sect or schism. 
I do not remember that I ever read otherwise 
in any writer that I could find treating of these 
matters, that followed the canonical Scriptures, 
or did mean, or did pretend, so to do." 

1. It will be seen from these extracts, first, 
that infant baptism was the uninterrupted and 
undisputed faith and practice of the entire 
Church. Augustine says : " No Christian 
will say that they " (infants) " are baptized to 
no purpose!' 

2. They were as firmly settled in the convic- 
tion, also, that the practice was of divine insti- 
tutiony and descended from the apostles. Hear 
him : *' If any one do ask for divine author- 
ity " for infant baptism, " which the universal 
Church practices',' let him know it '' has not 
been ijzstituted by councils, but has always been 
observed',' and " is most justly believed to be noth- 



142 Infant Baptism. 

ing else than a thing delivered by the authority of 
the apostles!' 

3. We meet again with the view held by all 
the fathers, that baptisin sticceeds to, and supplies 
the office of, (so far as rites differing so much 
in form can supply the place of,) circumcision. 
" We may, besides, take a true estimate, how 
much the sacrament of baptism does avail in- 
fants, by the circumcision which God's former 
people received." 

4. The use of the phrase, " laver of regenera- 
tiony' as synonymous with baptism, indicates the 
sense (so common with the fathers) in which 
Justin Martyr, only forty years after the death 
of St. John, made use of the same word (regen- 
eration) in application to " childhood," etcnaLdojo ; 
and the affirmation of Augustine, only two hun- 
dred and sixty years later, that " original sin is 
forgiven to infants in the laver of regeneration," 
and that it is '^confirmed by the antiquity and 
authority of the Catholic faith, so notorious by 
the practice of the Church," places that "antiq- 
uity" very ;^^^r indeed, if it does not extend it 
into the time of the apostles. 

5. When we remember that no man living 
in the day of Augustine was probably better 
versed in the doctrines and history of the Church 



A ugustine ' s Testimony. 143 

than he was ; and that he wrote the history of 
*'ali the sects and opinions" that were known 
to have arisen in the Christian world down to 
his time, making eighty-eight heresies in all : 
the statement that he had never heard of or 
READ OF any Christians, either of the general 
Church, or of any sect or schism, who had not 
constantly held that baptized infants do obtain 
remission of original sin by the baptism of 
Christ, places the evidence of the divine author- 
ization of infant baptism completely beyond all 
reasonable dispute. 

§ 8. The Testimo7iy of Pelagms a7id Celestius. 

'' Pelagius and Celestius," says Mosheiin, '' the 
former a Briton and the latter an Irishman, 
both monks living at Rome, and in high repu- 
tation for their virtue and piety, conceived that 
the doctrines of Christians concerning the in- 
nate depravity of man, and the necessity of in- 
ternal divine grace, in order to the illumination 
and renovation of the soul, tended to discourage 
human efforts, and were a great impediment to 
the progress of holiness, and, of course, ought 
to be rooted out of the Church. ... In the year 
410, on account of the invasion of the Goths, 
thev retired from Rome, and going first to 



144 Infant Baptism 

Sicily, and thence to Africa, they more openly 
advanced their opinions. From Africa, Pela- 
giiis went to Egypt ; but Celestius continued at 
Carthage, and solicited a place among the- pres- 
byters of that city. But his novel opinions be- 
ing detected, he was condemned in a council at 
Carthage, A.D. 412." 

From this time Angus tine, now the famous 
Bishop of Hippo, began to assail with his pen 
the doctrines of Pelagius and Celestius, " and 
to him," says Moshehfiy "chiefly belongs the 
praise of suppressing the sect at its very birth." 

It was during this controversy that infant 
baptism was subjected to the severest criticisms 
that were ever brought to bear upon this dogma 
of the Church. Its mitiqtiity, scriptural author- 
ity, and utility, were submitted to the closest 
scrutiny, as these were points upon which the 
controversy largely depended. Pelagius and 
Celestius had affirmed that infants newly born 
are in the same state of moral picrity that Adam 
was befo7'e he fell ; while their opponents main- 
tained that they were the subjects of in7tate 
depravity, 

"As Pelagius and Celestius denied original 
sin," says Dr. Hibbard, "it would seem that 
they would, of course, deny the necessity of in- 



Pf.lagiics a7id Celestiiis' Testimony, 145 

fant baptism, for all the Christian world be- 
lieved that baptism was ' for the remission of 
sins.' Infants, indeed, were not supposed to 
have any actual sin, but yet there was that 
liability to punishment, that unfitness for heaven, 
that, without the atonement of Christ, is an in- 
separable property of our nature, and this the 
ancient Christian Church held was removed by, 
or at, baptism. A denial of the doctrine of 
innate depravity, therefore, appeared to carry 
with it, necessarily, a denial of the fitness and 
obligation of infant baptism. And so it did. 
Accordingly the great spirits in the Church who 
opposed Pelagius ceased not to press him with 
this argument, ' If infants are without fault in 
their nature, as you affirm, why, then, are they 
baptized t ' Now, any person can at once 
perceive how it became the interest of Pelagius 
to invalidate the practice and obligation of in- 
fant baptism if he could. He never met with a 
more difficult and troublesome argument, in all 
the circle of this famous and furious controversy, 
which shook and menaced the Church in Asia, 
Africa, and Europe, than this simple one with 
which he was constantly beset. 

** In vain did he attempt to shelter himself 

from the charge of denying the utility and obli- 
19 



146 ' Infant Baptism/ 

gation of infant baptism, by holding that infants 
needed baptism, not for the remission of any 
guilt, which he denied their having, but in 
order to fit them for the kingdom of heaven. 
In vain, I say, did he urge this distinction. He 
was met with the argument, ' If infants need 
baptism they are tmfit for heaven, which would 
argue their sinfulness.' * As for infants that 
die without baptism,' says Pelagius, * I know 
whither they do not go ; but whither they do 
go I know not ; that is, I know that they do 
not go to the kingdom of heaven ; but what be- 
comes of them I know not.' 

" But why this difficulty — this hard labor 
with the ar2:ument } Whv not cut the knot at 
once, by denying infant baptism 1 by pointing 
out its want of scriptural authority, and by dem- 
onstrating the fact that it had crept into the 
Church in an evil hour, under the auspices of 
ambitious and corrupt men t Let those who 
deny infant baptism reply to these questions." 
— Infant Baptism, pp. 215, 216. 

The subject of the Pelagian controversy is 
thus introduced in order that the testimony 
about to be cited may be the better compre- 
hended, and its value estimated in its bearing 
upon the subject in discussion. 



Pelagius and Celestius' Testimony, 147 

Pclagiiis, in a letter to the Bishop of Rome, 
says : *' Men do slander me as if I denied the 
sacrament of baptism to infants ;'' and declares 
that he '' never lieaj'd even an impions heretic who 
would affirm this concerning infants ; " (that is, 
that baptism was to be denied them,) and says 
further : " For ivho is so ignorant of the reading 
of the evangelists y as to attempt, {not to say to es- 
tablish, this doctrine, but) to speak of it heedless- 
ly, or even have sncJi a tJionght ? In fine, who 
can be so impious as to hinder iiifants from being 
baptized, and born again in Christ, and catise 
ihem^ to miss of the kingdom of heaven ; since 
our Saviour has said, that none can enter into 
the kingdom of heaven that is not born again 
of water and the Holy Spirit ? Who is there 
so impious as to refuse to an infant, of what 
age soever, the common redemption of mankind, 
and to hinder him that is born to an uncertain 
life from being born again to an everlasting and 
certain one ? " 

I. The reader will see that in all antiquity 
there was \}c\^profon7tdest conviction that infant 
baptism was not an innovation, resting upon 
authority merely human ; but that it was of 
divine institution. What an almost omnipo- 
tent leverage of power it would have placed in 



14 8 Infant Baptism. 

the hands of Pelagius, could he have denied its 
divine authorship : which he could have done 
by showing that it had its origin subsequent to 
the time of the apostles. He wrote the letter 
above cited to Innocent, Bishop of Rome, only 
317 years after the apostles ; and if infant bap- 
tism had originated in the fruitful imagination 
of some doctor of philosophy, or doctor of 
divinity, and had been palmed off upon the 
Christian world as an apostolic institution, Pe- 
lagius certainly had the means of knowing it. 
For he traveled much, and resided in many of 
the great Church centers of the world. 

The whole Christian world indorsed the 
tenet of the Constantinopolitan creed : *' We ac- 
knowledge ONE BAPTISM FOR THE PEMISSION OF 
SINS." But he denied that infants had any sin, 
and defended the practice of their baptism upon 
other grounds. But infant baptism upon the 
basis of the purity of infant nature is simply 
absurd. Now, could he have denied midcXiX. bap- 
tism, by showing its lack of the essential req- 
uisite — divine aiitliority — he would have spiked 
all the heaviest guns of the enemy, and turned 
their remaining batteries upon themselves. 
But, instead of this, he, nor any other person, 
ever showed or attempted to show the lack of 



Pelagitcs and Celestms Testimony. 149 

divine authority for the practice, (a fact in the 
argument perfectly overwhelming,) from the 
time of Christ to more than a thousand years 
afterward. He says, he " never heard even aii 
impious heretic who would affirm this ; " that is, 
that they were 7iot to be baptized. 

The testimony of Celestius is found in the 
following : '' But we acknowledge infants ought 
to be baptized for the remission of sins, accord- 
ing TO THE RULE OF THE UNIVERSAL ChURCH, 
and ACCORDING TO THE SENTENCE OF THE GOS- 

PEL, because our Lord has ordained that the king- 
dom of heaven shall be bestowed upon no person 
except he be baptized; which, as men do not re- 
ceive it by nature, it is necessary to confer by 
the power (or liberty) of grace/' 

1. The testimony of Celestius accords with 
that of all antiquity, .that infant baptism was 
*' the rule of the universal Church," though his 
admission that infants ought to be baptized for 
the remission of sins illy agrees with his denial 
of their depravity. 

2. It will be noticed that Celestius and 
Pelagius both declare they never heard of any 
person who denied infant baptism. On this 
fact Mr. Wall, as cited by Hibbard, has the fol- 
lowing: " If there had been any such Church of 



150 Infant Baptism. 

anti-Pedobaptists in the world, these men could 
not have missed an opportunity of hearing of 
them, being so great travelers as they were. 
For they were born and bred, one in Britain, the 
other in Ireland. They lived the prime of their 
age (a very long time, as St. Austin testifies) 
at Rome — a place to which all the people of 
the world had then a resort. 

" They were both for some time at Carthage, 
in Africa. Then the one (Pelagius) settled at 
Jerusalem, and the other (Celestius) traveled 
through all the noted Greek and Eastern 
Churches in Europe and Asia. It is impossible 
there should have been any Church that had 
any singular practice in this matter, but they 
must have heard of them. So that one may 
fairly conclude that there was not at this time, 
nor in the memory of the men of this time, 
any Christian society that denied baptism to 
infants. 

" This cuts off at once all the pretenses which 
some anti-Pedobaptists would raise from certain 
probabilities that the Novatians, or Donatists, 
or the British Churches of these times, or any 
other whom Pelagius must needs have known, 
did deny it." — Infant Baptism^ part i, chap, xix, 
sec. 36. 



yerome's Testimony, 151 

§ 9. The Testimony of Jerome and the Fifth Council 
of Carthage. 

St. yeromf S2iys to Pelagiits'. "This one thing 
I will say, that this discourse may at last have 
an end. Either you must set forth a new creed, 
and after the Father, the Son, and the Holy 
Ghost, baptize infants into the kingdom of 
heaven : or else, if you acknowledge one bap- 
tism for infants and for grown persons, you 
must own that infants are to be baptized for the 
forgiveness of sins." 

In this extract the allusion to infant baptism 
is purely incidental; but it shows the convic- 
tion of its divine authority to have been pro- 
found and iiniversaL 

The following is the decision of The Fifth 
Council of Carthage^ which was held about A. D. 
415, as expressed in its sixth canon^ touching 
the baptism of those who were supposed to have 
been baptized in infancy, but of whose baptism 
there was no positive witness. I cite this action 
of the council because it not only shows the 
universal practice upon the subject under dis- 
cussion, but exhibits also the received doctrine 
of the Church respecting all doubtful cases : — 

" It is resolved concerning infants of whose 
having been baptized there are no positive wit- 



I5;2 Infant Baptism. 

nesses that can give certain evidence, and they 
themselves are not capable of giving any ac- 
count of that sacrament having been adminis- 
tered to them, by reason of their age ; that such 
be, without any scruple, baptized." 

A sensible and sound decision ! If there be 
no positive proof of the baptism of any person 
who wishes to serve God and get to heaven ; 
then let him be baptized, and *' without any 
scrujjle.'' But let not any person or sect pre- 
sume to give the Christian ordinance to any 
who have already received it, whether in infancy 
or at any other time! Such is second, or re- 
baptism, and rests upon 7w divine authority, 

§ lo. Statements and Conctusio7t. 

All parties admit that from the time of Au- 
gustine, who died A. D. 430, down to the twelfth 
century, there was known to appear no sect or 
person to oppose infant baptism. It is, there- 
fore, not necessary to quote additional testi- 
mony to confirm a fact so well established. 

An incident cited by Hibbard from Wall 
(part ii, chap, ii, sec. 2) will illustrate the uni- 
versal prevalence of the practice in those me- 
dieval ages. " Cassander, who wrote in the 



Statements and Conelusion. 153 

twelfth century against the novel heresy that 
had sprung up, and had been propagated by 
Peter Bruis, who denied infant baptism, aggra- 
vates the charge of novelty by stating that if 
infant baptism were only a mock baptism, as 
Bruis alleged, then, 'as all France, Spain, Ger- 
many, and Italy, and all Europe, has had never 
a person baptized now for three hundred or al- 
most five hundred years, otherwise than in in- 
fancy, it has had never a Christian in it/" 

It is evident that, from the earliest mention 
of infant baptism by the patristic writers, the 
entire Christian world practiced it without any 
such controversy as would imply the least doubt 
in regard to its divine authority, (and this, I 
think, is generally admitted by all parties,) un- 
til the time of the Petrobrusians, (a sect called 
from Peter Bruis, in the Province of Dauphiny 
in France,) A. D. 1128. The Petrobrusians 
were the first body of men that ever denied in- 
fant baptism. And they seemed to have sur- 
vived not more than thirty years, when they 
entirely disappeared ; from which time until 
the rise of the German anti-Pedobaptists there 
is no account of any sect, party, or person, 
which denied or questioned the divine authority 

for the practice. 
20 



154 Infant Baptism. 

The following is an epitomized statement of 
the leading facts in the history of infant bap- 
tism, embodying conclusions founded upon long 
and thorough examination of the subject by Dr. 
Wall, than whom there is no higher authority. 
And they are hereby commended to the careful 
attention of the reader : — 

" Lastly, as these evidences are for the first 
four hundred years, in which there appears one 
man, Tertullian, that advised the delay of infant 
baptism in some cases ; and one, Gregory, that 
did, perhaps, practice such delay in the case of 
his children, but no society of men so thinking, 
or so practicing ; and no man saying it was un- 
lawful to baptize infants : so, in the next seven 
hundred years there is not so much as one man 
to be found that either spoke for, or practiced, 
any such delay. But all on the contrary. And 
when, about the year 1130, one sect among the 
Albigenses declared against the baptizing of 
infants, as being incapable of salvation, the main 
body of that people rejected their opinions, 
and they of them that held that opinion quickly 
dwindled away and disappeared, there being no 
more heard of holding that tenet till the rising 
of the German anti-Pedobaptists, A. D. 1522." 
— Wall, vol. ii, chap, x, p. 501. 



Conclusions. 1 5 5 

The foregoing presentation of the case, it is 
beh'eved, will amply justify the following Con- 
clusions : — 

1. It is certain that infant baptism was not a 
debated subject in the apostolic or primitive 
times. No man appears to have questioned its 
divine authorization until the twelfth century 
after Christ. There was not a word of con- 
troversy upon the subject, so far as history 
shows, until the time of Peter Bruis, A. D. 
1 128. 

2. This state of things could not possibly 
have existed, unless it had been either ttniver- 
sally PRACTICED or universally ignored, from 
the time of Christ down to the time in which 
the early Fathers made undoubted reference 
to it. 

3. It could not possibly have been tmiversal- 
ly IGNORED from the time of Christ, to the time 
these Fathers thus referred to it ; being ob- 
served by them without objection, and then have 
found its way into recognition and practice by 
all classes of professed Christians, by the time 
of Origen, A. D. 230 : unless the ever vigilant 
and faithful pen of history had taken cognizance 
of it as an unwarranted innovation. 

4. But history has not thus recognized it. 



iS6 Infant Baptism. 

Not less than six of the Christian Fathers, 
namely, Irenmis, A. D. 178; Hippolytus, 222; 
Epiphanius, 370; Philastrius, 380; who, ac- 
cording to Mosheim, "traveled nearly all over 
the Roman Empire, combating and endeavor- 
ing to convert, errorists of every sort ; " August 
tine, 428, and Theodoret, 430, (besides Terttil- 
Han and others who wrote less extensively upon 
the subject,) wrote each the history of all the 
sects, schisms, and heresies that were known 
to have existed from the days of Simon Ma- 
gus down to their times ; describing minutely, 
and with a careful hand, the rise, progress, 
and final issue, so far as known, of every 
erratic theological opinion and anti-Christian 
practice. 

Bnt they have nowhei^e mentioned infant 
BAPTISM except as divinely instituted a7id 

UNIVERSALLY RECEIVED. 

It therefore comes down to us indorsed with 
an amount and quality of historical evidence 
that places its apostolic sanction completely 
beyond all reasonable dispute. And, though 
we find in the Scriptures its most substantial 
and decisive support, so that were every 
syllable of testimony outside of the Bible de- 
stroyed, it would still rest on a firm foundation ; 



Conclusions, 157 

yet it is gratifying to trace the clear current 
of historical testimony from its inspired source 
down to ages and mark the sweep of its flow, 
as it bears to us the hallowed assurance that 
Infant Baptism is of God. 



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